I Hate Mondays
by Poplarmonster
Summary: Ugh. I HATE Mondays. They are the worst days of the week. And it's even worse when it's during school. Add Charlie Weasley, and Mondays are a bad way to spend a seventh of your life.
1. Weird Mondays

**Chapter One: Weird Mondays**

"_Now I would say sorry if I meant it." –Ashley Yata_

Ugh. I just absolutely hate Mondays. They are the worst day of the week. Especially this Monday. Today my twin brother and I have to go visit our mother's best friend. That means seeing her family. Not that they're all bad. Ginny is so adorable! And Ron is just a cutie pie. Fred and George are just awesome little tykes. They prank every one in sight, except me of course. I'm secretly teaching them pranks. Well actually I'm teaching them from a book that my friends and I are compiling. Percy is just pompous little child who seems to think he's the best at everything. Bill is two years older than me and he treats me like I'm actually smart. Well I am, but I'm not like my friend Monica, who is in Ravenclaw.

Then there's Charlie.

He pisses me off so much. He and Eric, my twin, are the best of friends. Good for them. This means that he gets dragged along to all of the little things we do over summer holidays. He teases me and makes all these comments about how fat I am. And that's one thing I know I'm not. Fat that is. He thinks I'm fat because he hangs around and dates all the skanky and anorexic girls in our year. I have nothing against anorexics, my own mother battles it every day. It's just that these people are bitchy drama queens and call themselves fat every second of the day. Trust me I know, I have to live with them during the school year.

There are four of these girls in my house, Gryffindor. I hate them almost as much as I hate my house. Now there's nothing bad about Gryffindor, I just don't belong. My three best friends are in Ravenclaw and Slytherin. Though Hannah is a nice Slytherin. Anyway these girls' names are Adrianna, Shelly, Sandra, and their leader, Carrie. Sandra is nice to me to my face, but she is a total bitch behind my back.

Back to Charlie, he dates these kinds of girls. It's quite scary actually. One week you'll see him with his arm draped around a skanky hoe from Slytherin and the next another one from Hufflepuff. I think he's slept with all the girls in Gryffindor alone ten times each. Of course I could be wrong, because all I hear them talking about is how hot he could be. So he might not be a male slut after all…hmmm. I'll need to do research.

Noooo! My brother just came bounding in and demand that I get up. My brother doesn't actually look like me, only sort of. He has sandy blonde hair while I have strawberry blonde hair that is layered that goes to my shoulders. It's quite amusing that I have blonde hair and blue eyes. Do you know how often I get stereotyped? It's quite amusing. But at least I have natural blonde hair, unlike Carrie and friends, who dye theirs platinum. Sandra has dark brown hair, Adrianna has plain brown hair, Shelly has dirty blonde, and Carrie, well, I really have no idea what color hair that girl has. She came to Hogwarts with it dyed pink, and then dyed it so often that it got all destroyed. Then she settled on red for three years and switched to black, then platinum blonde.

The only thing my brother and I have in common is our parents and our eyes. That's the one thing I like about me, my eyes. They are a deep endless blue with flecks of light blue.

"Get up NOW!" Eric said as he pulled away all of my covers. How rude. He can be such a prick sometimes. And I was having such a lovely conversation with myself. I told him how rude he was, but it came out more as a mumble.

"Look I know you're in love with Charlie, but can we please hurry this up?" now this was cause for punishment. I do not like Charlie. God my brother is such a moron. SO what do I do? I sit up so fast and punch him on the side of the face. Heh, boy am I glad my dad stuck me in that karate class instead of ballet.

"Ow! What was that for?" he asked.

"For suggesting that I was in love with a loser," I replied, annoyed. "And for coming in my room at the crack of dawn to wake me up!"

"Ashley, ten o' clock isn't the crack of dawn and I only said that to get you up," Eric stated matter of factly. God he was so annoying sometimes. But he was my twin and I had to put up with him.

"Good, now get out so I'm able to get up!" I snapped. I didn't mean to snap, but I am NOT a morning person. I hate mornings with a passion and Monday mornings are the worst.

"Fine. Whatever." Boy did he sound annoyed. Oh well, he'll get over it. So I got up and got dressed. I wore a plain green t shirt that said 'Please Officer, I swear to drunk I'm not God.' I love that shirt. After a few minutes I heard my mother stomp upstairs and demand if I was ready. I assured her I would be in a few minutes and she went back downstairs, probably to pace back and forth until I came down.

So I quickly snapped two black barrettes into my hair and pulled on a pair of black flairs and ran downstairs. My mother glared at me as a dashed to the fireplace and proceeded to floo myself over to the Burrow.

My brother was already there, sitting with Charlie on the couch. I noticed the punch I gave him earlier was developing into a nice black eye. Heh, he deserved it. He knows better than to say stupid stuff to me in the morning, especially on Mondays.

"Why is it that girls are always late?" that was the first question out of Charlie's mouth. Now you must know that normally, out of politeness, I would ignore that comment. But since today was Monday and I was in a particularly bad mood, I decided to act like my normal sarcastically bitchy self.

"Sounds like you were actually waiting for me," I replied.

"So what if I was?" Charlie asked.

"Well you're going to have to wait longer because I forgot my makeup bag!" I responded in a fake sugar coated obviously sarcastic voice. I then sauntered out the house. Heh. Did you know how fun it is to tell people in an inadvertent way that you don't want to talk to them? Of course there's the fact that they ignore me too, so there's really no point.

Ahh. I just love the fields around the Burrow. It's so calming. Especially this one place, where there was a cliff overlooking a beautiful forest. Oh my god that is my official hiding spot. I come out here a lot. Nobody knows that I go here, I don't think. But I have never caught anyone following me out here.

So of course I was totally surprised when I heard a soft voice in my ear.

"Since when did you keep your makeup bag out here?" I didn't think, I just reacted. I whipped my elbow around and connected into something hard. I heard a grunt of pain and I spun around.

I was half shocked to see Charlie laying on the ground, covering his eye.

"Now I would say sorry if I meant it. But I'm not so are you okay?" I asked, somewhat concerned if I had blinded him in one eye. It was a well known fact that Charlie was a fantastic seeker and would probably play for England once he graduated. I didn't want to ruin his chances at anything, so I decided to worry slightly.

"I'm fine," he replied shortly. "What are you doing out here anyway?"

"Looking for my makeup bag," I smirked as I replied. I started walking back towards the house, making it known that I wasn't going to waste my time talking to him. He didn't get the hint and started following me. God, guys can be _so_ dense sometimes. I mean really!

"Where did you come from?" he asked me. Wow, he was serious for once.

"Whatta ya mean?" I ask. I mean come on! I've been here all along. Dumbass.

"I mean whenever you were around me you'd always never talk. I'd insult you to see if I could get some emotion out of you. Where did the sarcastic, mean, cool girl come from?"

"I never talked to you because you were an asshole to me. We were friends before Hogwarts, then you guys got all 'oh my god! Girls are so evil! If we touch one we'll DIE!" I said as I did an overly dramatic interpretation of how they were when they were twelve. "So I ignored you. Then you started insulting me, so I ignored you even more and secretly tapped your face to my wall and threw darts at it." Why I was telling him this, I have no clue. He weaseled it out of me. Heh.

"Ahhh." He looked as if he had just seen the light at the end of the tunnel. I took this opportunity to whip out the tape I had made of Carrie screeching 'I SEE THE LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TUUUUUUNNEL!' I was experimenting to see if muggle electronics would work at the platform, but it didn't. It did, however, when we left the platform and I had the unpleasant experience of being right next to her when she burst into screech.

"What the hell is that?" Charlie asked, surprised. Heh, I'm surprised he can't recognize the screech as his girlfriend. Yes, Charlie is now going out with Carrie. They've been going out since the end of school and Carrie thinks they are meant to be because he hasn't dumped her yet.

"I can't believe you don't recognize your girlfriend!" I said in mock surprise.

"Phht. I only have her as a girlfriend so I don't have girls throwing themselves at me. It gets annoying after awhile."

"Wow! THE Charlie Weasley has gone from an all out player to a dedicated boyfriend in two seconds! Amazing!" I said, sarcasm dripping from my lips.

""I only have cause I know she'll freak out and go all evil if she sees a girl so much as look at me," he snorted as he replied. God when did he ever snort? Snorting is so unattractive. That's why I do it all the time. I mean I get all the guys' attention and they flirt with me! Wait…wow I'm really confusing myself here…strange I tend to do that.

"Heh, it's so funny to listen to her ramble on and on about you. I swear she has your wedding all planned out, she even named your kids," I said, with a twinkle of amusement in my eyes.

He looked at me disgusted. "Well then I think I'm going to dump her when we get back to school."

School. He had to bring up school. I thought of my friends. Hannah is in Slytherin and has wavy black hair that falls to half way down her back and navy blue, almost black eyes. She can be a tad evil and self centered sometimes. This can get annoying, so I usually remedy the situation by smacking her. But she is still one of my best friends. She also has a younger sister named Lily, who is the same age as Ron. Hmm they'll be going to school together. I'll have to make a bet with Hannah about how scared Ron is going to be of Lily.

Monica is in Ravenclaw and she has long chestnut hair, longer than Hannah's, it goes all the way down her back. She has bright hazel green eyes, always searching for random facts to memorize. Monica is actually quite pretty, and even though she doesn't notice, she's one of the most sought after girls in the school. All the guys are scared of me and Hannah, though, and they stay away from her when we're near, which is most of the time.

Chaki is our other friend. She's the brains of our group. She has brown hair that, depending on the lighting, has a slight tint or red or a slight tint of blonde and green eyes. Chaki does extremely well in all her subjects, but she is athletically impaired. In first year, I heard that she flew straight into a tree.

School brings wonderful thoughts. But there is always Carrie, who is such a moron. I don't even want to start ranting on her again. Wherever she is, Charlie is. And wherever Charlie is, my brother is.

Well I don't want to make my twin out to be this moron who follows people around like a lost dog. He's actually much deeper than that. But I don't feel like explaining the inner depths of my brother's mind. It's too complicated for my confused brain to handle.

"Whatcha thinking about?" I heard Charlie ask me. Great now he suddenly cares. Whoopee.

"I'm thinking about all the practical jokes I can play this year in an attempt to forget about the fact that I haven't done any of my homework," I replied snootily. I love that word. Snootily. SNOOT.

Heh. I amuse myself so easily.

Charlie just raised an eyebrow. We finally got back to the house and my brother was there smiling. I knew he was thinking something along the lines of 'having fun.' Great, just what I needed. My brother making comments on the fact that I was acting like a normal human being for once. Well around the Weasleys I always act civil; I just was being weird before.

"Have fun having fun?" he asked suggestively. Ew, how did I know he was going to say that? Sheesh.

"Now Eric what kind of sister would I be if I stole your boyfriend? I mean c'mon, you wouldn't steal any of the guys I date now would you?"

They both stood there with their mouths slightly open. Heh. I love being evil.

"Well I gotta go write my friends, see you guys at dinner!" I just winked and walked upstairs.

What a weird Monday.

**HALLELUJAH! IT IS DONE! Wow it took me forever to write this. Three weeks! Wow! Long time. Well I'm glad I got this up, now I will go play Rose Online. I WILL update this, don't worry. I have a rabid monster after me if I don't (Hannah). So cya next time!**

**June 14- I changed a couple things around, hope you don't mind **


	2. Strange Summers

**Chapter 2: Strange Summers**

_Carrie is the most beautiful innocent intelligent angel I have ever seen. -Charlie Weasley_

Ahhh. Finally! School is here! Well actually it's tomorrow, but it's almost here! Now you must be wondering why right now I'm excited about school. Well there are three reasons. There names are Hannah, Monica, and Chaki. Right now I'm giggling madly and throwing all my clothes joyously into my trunk.

Charlie is just standing on the doorway watching me pack. It's really creeping me out. He has been doing that a lot lately. But I got him back through teaching Fred and George.

Fred and George are so much fun to teach pranks to. They are always ready to learn and I can teach them pranks I have never even pulled. Of course Charlie and Eric are our test subjects. Heh. When we get back to school, Carrie and her little group of skanks will fill that spot.

"You really like packing, don't you?" Charlie observed.

"Yea! Packing means I get to leave and go to a new place and get out of the same routine over and over again. Plus when I get back to school I get to laugh at how moronic the skanks are," I replied happily. Wow I was _way_ too cheery for just going back to school. I mean come on, who actually wants to go back to school? I have really lost it.

"Moronic skanks? You don't mean my wonderful girlfriend Carrie now do you?" he asked, pouting.

"Aww. I know you're in love with her and all, but you have to admit she is a skanky hoe who has been around school more times than I can count," I replied back.

"Then you must not be able to count properly, Miss Yata," he smirked back. Oh he's gonna get it one of these days. I just glared at him. He smirked even more and followed up with, "Carrie is the most beautiful innocent intelligent angel I have ever seen."

I just stared at him for a second and then we burst out laughing. He stumbled over to me and we leaned on each other for support we were laughing so hard. Eric walked in and asked, "What's so funny?"

"H-He s-s-aid that C-Car-r-rrie is t-the most b-beaut-tiful in-in-innocent in-intelligent angel he's ever se-ee-ee-n!" I choked out laughing harder with each passing syllable. Eric just sighed and left the room mumbling something about being surrounded by morons. Hey that's my line. It's not fair that he can just steal my lines! Oh well.

We stopped laughing as suddenly as we started and just stared at each other. I looked into his eyes and…whoa, when did his eyes get so gorgeous? Blue with streaks of green and a little bit of brown. WHAT THE HELL? Why am I even thinking this? What is wrong with me?

"Well I gotta finish packing," I said cheerily, breaking the silence.

"Yea, I should go contemplate packing too," he replied, sighing slightly.

"You haven't started packing?"

"Nope. Mom usually does it for me!"

"Lazy ass."

"Hey!"

"Pack," I said and I shoved him out the door, closed it, and locked it, effectively keeping him and his beautiful eyes out. Where the hell did that come from? Beautiful eyes? No way! Tomorrow will be school and I can ignore him and forget about him.

I went back to packing and twenty minutes I was all ready to go. Too bad it was an hour before dinner, so I had to find something to amuse myself. So I decided to go to the cliff past the golden fields, the fragile grass taller than me by an inch.

Oh. My. God. I am turning into a poet. A creepy little girl who pays more attention to what's on the outside than what's on the inside. Of course there are always those poets who see what's on the inside and totally ignore what's going on around them. I have nothing against poets, I just don't really want to be one. A philosopher, yes, poet, no.

So I went through the field and out to the cliff. The sunset was breathtaking. The sky was a beautiful shade of red, gold and orange. Summer sunsets are so pretty. So I sat down and closed my eyes. Why, you ask, would I do this when there's a beautiful sunset in front of me? Well it relaxes me and meditating heightens my sense of what's around me. I can sense things that are close to me.

Of course I could paranoid.

Just wonderful. Someone's coming. Three guesses who. He seems to like to follow me around lately which is annoying. At least he's not insulting me like he used too. Oh well, when we all get back to school he can go back to his popular crowd and leave me and my little group of misfits alone. Because that's what we are.

Misfits.

Sounds awful doesn't it? Not really. We like it like that. We're the oddballs and that's the way it always has been, we don't really care.

"Shouldn't you be packing?" I deadpanned I mean come on, who takes only ten minutes to pack? You have to neatly stuff all of your stuff into a trunk and make sure it shuts properly. I would take only five minutes to pack, except that it takes me an hour at least of re organizing all the crap so my stuff can all fit and the trunk actually closes.

"Nah, I finished," he replied. Haha, yea right. It's not humanly possible to be done that fast. Unless of course he had help. That's funny. He's sixteen and he still needs help packing his stuff for school. How pathetic.

I turn and look at him, but my sarcastic remark was lost. With the colors reflecting on his face, he looked sort of cute. In a bizarre messed up creepily weird way. Weird.

"Ah, school tomorrow," I said, leaning back onto my hands and looking out to the sunset. God it was beautiful. Today was Saturday and that was good. But then there was Sunday and then Monday. Ew. I hate Mondays. They just suck.

"Yea. Back to the evilness of homework and Snape," he said. He did not just use evilness. That is way off character for him. Is there something wrong? I hope he's not depressed or something. What if he kills himself? Whoa, when did I get this worried? I AM A FREAK. Yes ladies and gents, it's true. "Do you like him?"

Huh. Did I miss something? Who is he talking about? "Snape?" I asked. He nodded his head and I replied, "Not really. I know I'm his pet, but, well, actually I find it hilarious how he picks on Carrie and her whore-clan." I remembered all the fond memories of Snape yelling at Carrie for making stupid mistakes.

Carrie sucks at everything, except sleeping around. And even then I hear she's really bad. It's really awful to have to room with her, so I bring my shrinkable poofcouch with me and I set it up in the Ravenclaw dorms. Hannah has one too so we sleep there often. There is only one other girl other than Monica and Chaki and she doesn't talk much. Her name is Elena and she never says a word about anything.

So we sleep there. Sometimes I have to sleep in Gryffindor dorms and it's really bad. All four of them snore really badly and I never can sleep. I normally go down to the common room and sleep on the couch that's there.

But I have to keep a lock on my trunk so Carrie and her gang don't go through my stuff. I started putting a lock on when I saw Shelly wearing one of my favorite shirts. I was so pissed. So I pranked the hell out of her and put a lock on. The girls are too stupid to use Alohamora, so I have nothing to worry about.

Charlie and I just sat there for a few minutes in total silence. The silence was starting to bother me, so I decided to go.

"I'm going to go inside," I said, standing up abruptly and started to walk away.

"Hey wait," Charlie said as he got to his feet and grabbed my arm. I turned around and came right up to his face. Our noses were literally centimeters apart.

"You have such beautiful eyes," he murmured. Whoa, where did that come from?

"I have to go," I said softly and I turned away roughly and walked towards the house.

What a strange summer

**Yay! It's done! I'm sorry that it's a little short, I had to rush to get it up before I leave for Florida for ten days, where I won't get a chance to write. Amazingly I updated earlier than usual for me, maybe it's because I like this fic. So I'll leave you alone for now, until next time! February OUT!**


	3. Back To School HUZZAH

**Back To School HUZZAH!**

"_Oh my god Ashley! You're going to get so fat!" – Carrie Placebogern_

Ahh. I love trains. Especially the Hogwarts Express. The scenery rushing by the window at high speeds is highly amusing. It's like ZOOM there goes a tree. And the cows are hilarious. It's like slow motion eating. Down….then up. Like a bobble head! It's so amazing. Really? No. But that's okay; we all will get over it.

"Oh Charlie!" I heard a screech come from right outside the compartment, and Monica and I exchanged a look and I got up and pulled the door open.

"Hey, Carrie? Can you please shut up? I mean I have to deal will that god awful voice of yours all year and it's just too early, can't you guys just go to an abandoned compartment and make out and get over it?" I said as I looked at a bewildered Carrie and Charlie standing there. Carrie had tears streaking down her face and it seemed as if Charlie had broken up with her.

"Oh Ashley!" she cried as she latched onto me. I gave a loud shout and she continued sobbing all over me.

"Carrie, get off of me," I said calmly as I tried to pry myself free from her iron grip. Her grip is worse than Monnie, and Monnie has the death grip of doom. Oh lookie, Charlie went away. Hallelujah. He could have at least helped me get her off me. But nooo, he had to go suck the face off of some other nameless girl.

"CARRIE, GET THE HELL OFF OF ME!" I finally had to resort to screaming. I actually was annoyed. And I never get annoyed, only at people who are on the People Who Piss Me Off list which consist of Carrie, Adrianna, Shelly, Sandra, and Charlie. He keeps popping up, doesn't he? Weird. Very weird. Oh well, it really doesn't matter.

I shoved Carrie off me, stomped into the compartment Monica and I were camping out in, and slammed the door shut.

"I never want to have to go through that trauma again," I told her.

"Yea, you might have to see a counselor!" she joked back.

"Yup! And then I'll have to drag you and the others so I can have…uhhh how many shoulders do we have?" I asked confusedly. See I knew the answer, I was just toying with her. I was, seriously. I was! It's not like I'm stupid enough not to know what four times two is.

About a half hour passed and we were still sitting there, chatting about our summer. I didn't tell her about the last week or so, I probably would never tell anyone. Not that it's embarrassing or anything, but they'd probably just start laughing at me and tease me about it. I know I'm a hypocrite, because I do the same thing to them, but for some reason I hate being laughed at. It makes me feel as if I'm a deformity or something and that really scares me.

So my lips are sealed. Anyway, Hannah and Chaki flew in, well actually Hannah did, but they had lots to tell about the prefect meetings. I was glad I wasn't a prefect, from what I heard from Bill, it's hell. Of course, he was basking in the comforts of being Head Boy last year.

Next year Chaki will probably be the Head Girl, because, well, it's Chaki and she's the only person I know who actually deserves the position. Anyway, they came in and we talked and joked around for a while, I actually had to smack Hannah a few times, but other then that the ride was pretty calm.

That was until the king of morons came sauntering in, back from his latest make out session and plopped down next to me. See, a regular compartment held six people and there were only four of us. I had moved from my comfy window seat to make room for Chaki, so I had to put up with Sir I've-Been-Around-The-Block-A-Lot sitting next to me.

Eric came in after him and sat down next to Hannah, but I didn't notice at first, because of the red headed fiend sitting next to me.

"Why are you here?" I asked him, breaking the deafening silence that seized the compartment.

"Just visiting my favorite gal pal!" he said cheerily, throwing his arm around me. I grabbed the closed book that was on Chaki's lap and whacked him in the face. Just my luck, it was a heavy book.

"What was that for!"

"For being assertive and moronic."

"What!"

"You heard me. Now _scram_!" I yelled.

"And leave my best bud alone in a compartment full of girls?" This was the first time I noticed Eric was there. And he was sitting next to Hannah, beet red.

"Fine. I'll give up every last shred of dignity I have in hopes that those two will finally get over themselves and ask the other out. I mean c'mon, how dense are they?"

"Pretty dense. He moans and groans, she'll never like me! What ever shall I do?" Charlie mimicked a very girly Eric.

"Yea, and she's all like, I gotta dress up! How do I look? Oh why doesn't he like me? Why can't I be perfect?" I said, acting like Hannah was when she got in the mood to complain. Meanwhile, Chaki was reading her book while smiling broadly. Monica was practically falling off her seat in tears. Hannah was glaring at me through her deep red flushed face and Eric was trying to stop blushing.

"But one is Slytherin," I said, hoping to get Charlie to follow along. Charlie could get real funny when he started.

"And the other is a Gryffindor," he replied, catching my drift.

"A tragic love story!" we both dramatically sighed. It was hilarious. Of course Charlie's younger brother Percy, who was starting his first year at Hogwarts, had to come in and ruin the moment.

"Can you please be quiet, I'm trying to study," the snotty little brat asked, well, snottily. He then shut the door and apparently walked away. I slouched down in the seat and said, "He ruins all the fun!"

Hannah reached over and smacked me, and then smacked Charlie. We both grumbled a bit and then quieted down.

Charlie quietly talked with Eric, Eric and I had switched seats. It was cool, because all we did was glance at one another and we knew what the other wanted. I have a good relationship with my brother; no matter how annoying he is I will always stick up for him and support him. Great, now I sound like some old hag. Wonderful.

Well my thought strayed away form Eric and towards Charlie. It was amazing how a month could change a person. I mean last year there would have been no way he would have been here. He was so mean last year. I think he might have actually grown up.

Which was weird. Very weird. It wasn't normal for someone to suddenly change, unless they were trying to impress someone, or they were trying to impress someone before and they dropped that fake shell.

That's one thing I despise. Fake shells. People shouldn't hide behind a façade. They should face their fears, no matter how hard it is or no matter how painful it is. If you just hide, your life will be an empty, pointless experience and you will die unhappy.

Back to the point, Charlie was being very weird. He was acting very strange. But I didn't dwell upon it; instead I took out a little notebook. The notebook was a collection of little stories I would write whenever I was bored. I needed something to do so I decided to write a little bit. I wrote a really depressing poem because I knew Hannah was inadvertently looking over my shoulder, and it's really funny to watch her worry.

A great philosopher once said, "Hannah doesn't need exercise; she gets more than she needs from worrying in place." Actually I believe her mother said that. It's quite amusing.

I glanced over at her, and saw worry written on her face. But when she saw me grinning like the Cheshire cat, she smacked me upside the head and turned and pouted at the wall. Eric and Charlie just stared at me, while Chaki and Monica, used to this behavior, ignored everyone as there were in a deep conversation on something only they could understand.

It was creepy, the way they talked about things. They once tried to explain to me and I just gave them a blank stare. This was over Christmas break when Hannah was in the Hospital Wing because her younger sister Lily decided it would be fun to throw really heavy things at her.

Lily was a sweet little monster. She was seven, nine years younger than us, and she liked to cause trouble. She was actually the same age as Charlie's younger brother, Ron. If they ever meet at Hogwarts, Ron is going to run as far as he can, I just know it.

Ron is the complete opposite than the twins when it comes to me. While the twins flock to me, Ron runs away whenever he sees me. I mean I know he must be a little freaked out that I told the twins to turn his favorite stuffed animal into a spider, but still. Oh well, you can't please everybody.

The train ride passed quickly, and nothing of importance except everyone climbing over themselves to get to the food cart. It has a much more sophisticated name, but I don't pay attention enough to know it.

We finally got to Hogwarts and Hannah, Monica, Chaki, and I ran off to a carriage. Luckily carriages only hold four people, so we wouldn't have any unexpected guests this time.

"So guys, what are we gonna do for the feast? It should definitely be better than our last prank," I asked. We always did a back to school prank. We think our idols, the legendary Marauders, did something of the sort. And the beginning of the year prank was the best because it was spontaneous.

"Well we could kidnap someone or something," Chaki offered. I know, Chaki seems like a kind, sweet, innocent girl, but underneath, she's an evil, scheming, but really fun girl.

"Let's blow something up!" Hannah exclaimed. Monica, Chaki, and I turned to her and all said no at the same time. I mean really, blowing up stuff is like so last year! Totally! Like sure! Like I just got a manicure! The sun! I swear! It's bleaching up my gorgeous hair! Go go! Fight fight! Gee I hope I look alright! Cause I got a date tonight! GO ME! Whoopee!

I muttered the last word under my breath and the three of them looked at me oddly.

"Great, now she's talking to herself," Hannah said.

"I didn't do it I swear!" I protested. I didn't do it. I swear. Though it's not nice to swear. Nope.

"Well we could make something disappear," Monica said after a few minutes, reverting back to our other conversation.

"Like the Sorting Hat!" I explained the idea that had popped into my head.

"Yea, that'd be funny! Hannah, do you know any invisible spells?" Chaki asked Hannah. You se, in our group, I was the one who came up with the basic idea, Monica developed it and Chaki polished it off to perfection. Then we had Hannah perform it because she didn't really care if she got caught, and plus it added to her evilness. Except this time Monica and I were switched, so we switch on and off a lot. But still he structure is basically the same.

"Okay this is what we'll do," Chaki said after a couple of minutes.

The carriage came to a halt and we had finished our planning. We exited the comfy car with its plush interior and velvety seats…

We went into the Great Hall, huddled together for a bit, and then I walked over to the Gryffindor table and plopped down next to my twin.

"What'd you do this time?" Charlie asked me suspiciously.

"What?" I looked at him innocently, a huge grin implanted on my face.

"Oh come on, everyone knows you and your little group do a back to school prank every year," Carrie said snootily. She was really getting on my nerves.

"Geez, what crawled up your ass and died?" I asked her, mildly annoyed.

"I loved him so much!" she replied as she broke down crying. Shelly, Adriana, and Sandra were immediately at her side, comforting her. I blinked and realized that my stomach was making demands for an offering. See my stomach demands offerings three times a day, if it doesn't get what it wants; it makes me feel like crap. Yes it's true, my stomach rules my life. Luckily I get lots off exercise otherwise I'd be the size of Russia. I'd waddle around like a penguin!

Well my stomach was getting really mad, so I shouted out, "Where's the grub? I'm getting hungry here!"

Luckily Dumbledore took that as a sign to begin the sorting. "Let the Sorting begin!"

This was the highlight of the whole night. Luckily, before Dumbledore had spoke those words, everyone was talking and no one noticed the Sorting Hat mysteriously disappear a few moments before.

There was a collective gasp, and then the Sorting Hat burst out into song.

_A thousand years ago or more_  
_When I was newly sewn,_  
_There lived four wizards of renown,_  
_Whose names are still well known:_  
_Bold Gryffindor, from wild moor,_  
_Fair Ravenclaw, from glen,_  
_Sweet Hufflepuff, from valley broad,_  
_Shrewd Slytherin, from fen,_  
_They shared a wish, a hope, a dream,_  
_They hatched a daring plan_  
_To educate young sorcerers_  
_Thus Hogwarts School began._  
_Now each of these four founders_  
_Formed their own house, for each_  
_Did value different virtues_  
_In the ones they had to teach._  
_By Gryffindor, the bravest were_  
_Prized far beyond the rest;_  
_For Ravenclaw, the cleverest_  
_Would always be the best;_  
_For Hufflepuff, hard workers were_  
_Most worthy of admission;_  
_And power-hungry Slytherin_  
_Loved those of great ambition._  
_While still alive they did divide_  
_Their favorites from the throng,_  
_Yet how to pick the worthy ones_  
_When they were dead and gone?_

_'Twas Gryffindor who found the way,_  
_He whipped me off his head_  
_The founders put some brains in me_  
_So I could choose instead!_  
_Now slip me snug about your ears,_  
_I've never yet been wrong,_  
_I'll have a look inside your mind_  
_And tell where you belong!_

I think the Sorting Hat has seven songs or something that it repeats every seven years. Anyway, by now people were pretty freaked out. The first years looked terrified. It was quite amusing. But unfortunately one of the teachers realized what exactly was going on and performed the spell for unmasking things. The Sorting Hat appeared, in all its ratty glory waiting patiently to be placed upon a frightened eleven-year-old's head.

I glanced up at Dumbledore, just briefly, in case he got suspicious and I noticed that twinkle in his eye was shining brighter than usual. It's creepy that twinkle. In fact Dumbledore reminds me a lot of Santa Clause. Of course, not many people acknowledge Santa on our little island, but I here he's really popular in other places.

Anyway, the sorting was done and we could FINALLY eat. Except Dumbledore just had to give a speech first.

"Welcome to a brand new school year! Now may I remind you that the Forbidden Forest is forbidden, so I don't want to catch any of you there. Now let the feast begin!" and with that he clapped his hands and food appeared.

"Finally!" I said very loudly. I practically wolfed down my food, got seconds, ate that too, and finally finished up with a huge third helping. After I had finished I sat back and said, "Whew, I'm stuffed!"

"Oh my god Ashley! You're going to get so fat!" Carrie screeched at me. It seems as if she finally got over herself and stopped crying.

"Well then whatever guy has to deal with me will get a fat tub of lard instead of a normal human being," I retorted. "And plus I'm about the same size as Eric, so you're insulting him. Eric also happens to be the best friend of Charlie, so insulting Charlie's best friend is the same as insulting Charlie, so in fact by insulting me, you're insulting Charlie as well."

I smiled at this and she burst into tears and started apologizing profusely to Charlie who just looked at her like she was a nuisance, which is exactly what she was.

After dessert was served and I had a few helpings of that, everyone was filed out of the Great Hall. Suddenly Snape was up next to me.

"Miss Yata, Professor Dumbledore would like to see you."

Uhoh. Busted. Well I suppose fiver years at Hogwarts was better than none. I walked over to where Dumbledore was standing with McGonagall and my friends.

"This is an outrage! For years we have tolerated your little jokes! This is the last straw! All four of you will be severely punished!" Snape babbled.

"What for?" I asked.

"For pulling that prank during the feast!" he yelled.

"Prove it," Chaki said with a smug look on her face. Dumbledore raised an eyebrow and McGonagall just looked at her stonily.

"Excuse me?" Snape asked in disbelief.

"Prove that Hannah, Monica, Chaki, and I had anything to do with that prank. Because if you can't prove if we did it, then there's no way you can punish us for something we didn't do," I explained, offering him an understanding of Chaki's supreme wisdom. Heh. Not gonna comment on that comment.

Snape just slowly turned redder and redder and I got sick of standing around looking at him preparing to explode.

"That's twenty points from Gryffindor for being rude Miss Yata," McGonagall said. Great. I think that's a record for losing points on the very first day back.

"Yes well you do have a point and there's nothing we can do, so you four can go back to your dorms. Goodnight," Dumbledore said, with the twinkle back in his eye. I smiled and headed off towards the Gryffindor tower. I would probably spend a few days there, and then set up camp in Ravenclaw or the dungeons.

I finally got to the common room; I was told the password by the Head Girl wandering around in the halls. I climbed up the stairs to the dreaded room that was called my dorm. I hated my dorm. By now Carrie and her cronies would have the place all decorated and it would be sickening. I'm serious too. It's awful how much she messes up the place!

Well I walked into that dreaded room and I grabbed my pajamas out of my trunk. They consisted of some of Eric's old boxers and an oversized shirt that said 'I live in my own little world. But don't worry they know me here.'

I changed and hopped into bed, ignoring Carrie and her friends completely.

**OMG I UPDATED! IT IS SO AMAZING! HUZZAH! I've never actually got past the second chapter in a story before, so consider this a milestone. I really don't feel like going through it now, so I apologize for any mistakes. This chapter is also the longest I've ever written too, so that's cool as well! MOOHAHAHAHA! I shall go work on the next chapter, which might take a while as well, as I have no clue what's going to happen Oh well, until next time my pretties!**

**I might as well say it now: I DON'T OWN ANYTHING! I'M UNDER 18 SO SUE MY PARENTS NOT ME**

**Okay all done.**


	4. And Chaki Gets a Boyfriend

**Chapter 4- And Chaki Acquires a Boyfriend **

_That was refreshingly amusing –Ashley Yata_

It was a loud screeching. Directly in my ear. Okay maybe not, but pretty close. I cracked open an eye and glanced at my battery powered watch and saw it was four in the morning.

No. Freaking. Way. This cannot be happening! Carrie can't be having shrieking contests with her friends at this ungodly hour! They…no! I won't stand for it! One more giggle…

As if on cue they all burst into a loud shriek. It's harmonically depressing. They screeched again and I decided to take action. I sleepily rolled of my bed and onto the hard, cold, floor. Crap, I gotta get out of that habit.

So I picked myself and the idiotic morons hadn't noticed anything amuck. I crept over to them with my wand in my hand and petrificus totalused them. They were totally shocked as they saw it was me. It was quite amusing to see their eyes wiggle around.

"Now I can sleep," I said tiredly and I turned and went back to my bed and promptly fell asleep.

When I woke up a few hours later they were still there but it seemed as if they fell asleep. I cast the counter spell and released them and I performed a quick memory charm. Memory charms are quite useful when it comes to pranks. I really don't know or care if it's illegal, but I know Monica, Chaki, and I would never do anything bad. Hannah maybe because she's Slytherin and ALL Slytherins are evil.

Yea. Right. In fact when I think about it, I'd probably do the worst in my sleep walking than Hannah would with that spell. Though I can get pretty nasty when I'm sleepwalking. Like the time I almost landed Hannah in the Hospital Wing when she was sleeping over with Chaki and Monica after a particularly nasty fight with my mom. I guess I had some anger and I took it out on Hannah.

Plus I was having some bizarre dream as well. I think in the end I was screaming so loud Eric had to come in and tackle me. I woke up and asked why he tackled me. Then I told him about my wonderful dream of spoons eating tape. Why, I really don't know. I really don't want to know what goes on in the pile of mush that sits between my ears.

Anyway I trudged down the stairs in my uniform and robes. When I got to the bottom I was glad I had actually managed to remember my bag since I faintly heard Carrie wake up and I really didn't want to go back upstairs.

I faintly registered someone talking to me, so I ignored them, as I do most things on Monday mornings. I'm alert for the first ten minutes, then I blank out and become alert after breakfast ends. But during breakfast, I'm told you could have a better conversation with a sack of potatoes.

Whoever was talking to me had walked up beside me as I made my way down to the Great Hall. I vaguely registered Charlie's voice as he rambled on about something. I think it was quidditch.

Since the beginning of last year, Charlie Weasley has been the captain of the Gryffindor quidditch team. Surprisingly we've done really well. You see, I'm on the team as well; Eric and I are beaters. We won the quidditch cup last year and I think Charlie is already planning for this year. When he gets going, Charlie can rant on for hours about quidditch. Thankfully he doesn't do this very often and only dedicates a fourth of his brain towards quidditch.

"…and then we'll finish up with that."

I think he stopped talking. I looked up at him and said, "Huh? Did you say something?"

"You mean you haven't been paying attention this whole time? This is vital if we want the team to win this year!" he said, slightly exasperated.

"It's too early. Why did you have to start being obsessed _now_ of all times?" I asked, more like mumbled. Luckily he understood me.

"McGonagall just explained the importance of winning this year. It's essential!" he explained while frantically waving his arms around.

"And why is it essential?"

"Because anytime this year there will be scouts for teams here scouting out future players! We must win to impress!" he explained, still waving his arms. I didn't really care until one of them smacked me in the head. I growled and smacked him really hard upside the head. I spotted Monica and Chaki, waved a little goodbye to the shocked Charlie and ran off to them.

"Morning!" Monica said cheerily. She had always been a morning person. I walked over to her and put my forehead on her shoulder and mumbles "Good little pillow."

Monica, being used to this, just shrugged and walked off towards the hall leaving me to almost fall over. Some friend she is. No, actually she was probably scared I was going to drool all over her again.

I stood there for a couple of minutes when I heard Charlie and Eric behind me and I decided it would be in my best interest to move before they overwhelmed me with their quidditch obsession.

I got into the Great Hall when I spotted my three friends sitting at the Ravenclaw table. I went over to them and sat down next to Hannah, who was asleep on the table, and across from Chaki, who was next to Monica. We were at the end of the table closest to the door, in case we needed to bolt at anytime during the meal. The morning mail came in and I could swear I heard someone scream. Probably a first year. Heh that gave me an idea to be overly dramatic, but Hannah, being Hannah, beat me to it.

"Oh my god! The owls are gonna EAT me! HELP!" she screamed at the top of her lungs. This caused nearly all the first years to simultaneously scream. It was quite amusing in my half delirious half asleep state of mind.

Halfway though breakfast Dumbledore cleared his throat, signaling that he wanted to make an announcement. The hall grew quiet as he stood up and spoke.

"Because she was not here last night, I will make this announcement this morning. Your new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher will be Professor Nancy Pierell!" he announced cheerily.

This announcement caused Hannah to shoot up very suddenly and yell really loudly, "WHAT?"

"Hannah, sweetie!" the new teacher exclaimed very happily. It was creepy. She reminds me a little bit of Carrie. Wait, platinum blonde hair, dark roots, overload of makeup, yep, it's Carrie when she's fifty.

Hannah cowered behind me as I took a look at my timetable. Great. Potions first followed by a double period of Defense Against the Dark Arts. Just spiffy. Anyway, Hannah seemed close to tears, which is really strange. Monica and Chaki were staring at me like there was something wrong and Charlie and Eric were engaged in a mini food fight. Typical morning.

Breakfast came to an end, and Hannah and I headed off to Potions while Chaki and Monica headed off to their first class. I have most of my classes with Hannah because Dumbledore is slightly obsessed with house unity. It can get scary sometimes.

We seated ourselves next to one another and Snape can barreling in and glared at me. Oops. I think I lost the coveted teacher's pet position. Oh well, it just means I can't get away with as much stuff as I did last year.

"Now make this potion on the board," he growled, yes growled, and flicked the day's assignment on the board. He sat down and glared at the class. We all just assumed that we should work with the person next to us, so I turned to Hannah and we started.

The rest of the class was boring. But the day definitely got interesting during Defense Against the Dark Arts. I had that class with Hannah so we made our way over with idle chatter until Charlie and Eric decided it was in their best interest to walk with us.

"Hey darlin' what's up?" Charlie said cheerily as he threw his arm around my shoulder.

"Don't you have a girlfriend you can go bother?" I asked. Hannah was snickering behind me.

"Nope I'm single!" I heard a collective sighs of relief behind me. "Unless of course you're interested," he said wiggling his eyebrows. I jumped away, yanked Hannah's bag and brought it up into a graceful arc that smacked him directly in the face. He fell over and I gave a shocked Hannah back her bag.

"That was refreshingly amusing," I said as Hannah started giggling. "C'mon let's get to class." The three of us walked away and Charlie let out a groan. Suddenly, about ten second and third years were around him, obsessing at the chance to actually talk to the one and only Charlie Weasley.

"Was that such a smart idea?" Eric asked me after we had gotten out of earshot of the now pile of girls on Charlie.

"Probably not, be he still should know better than to play around like that. I have such fragile feelings," I said with a sniff at the end. Hannah started giggling and I grinned at her. She understood my drift and we raced off, leaving Eric there to walk alone. Awww, the poor bebe. He'll get over it.

We ran all the way to class and came to a halt outside the classroom. Hannah looked a bit scared at the thought of entering, so we just stood there until we had to in, unless we would have gotten in trouble for being late. Eric had somehow managed to slip past us and secured a table for four. Eric and Hannah sat next to each other on one end, so I was forced to sit next to Charlie when he got there. Great. Just my lucky day.

Charlie finally got there, and there was still no sign of the teacher. So we engaged in a small conversation.

"Pedophile."

"Jealous."

"As if."

"C'mon you know you want me."

"I'd rather sleep with Snape."

"Oh my GAWD," came a screech behind me. I recognized the voice as Sandra's. "You want to sleep with Snape?"

"No that's Charlie," I replied without turning around. Charlie just stared in horror as she acknowledged the new information I provided her and believed it. He spent the next few minutes trying to get her to not believe me, but she was a rock and immediately told her friends which cause Carrie to burst out in tears.

Meanwhile Hannah and Eric were trying to have a conversation, but from what I could tell they were both blushing so hard they couldn't talk without stuttering. I think that's cute. They make a cute couple. Now if one of them gets over the other and admits their feelings, then we'll be all set.

Anyway, the teacher finally came in and it was very scary. She was wearing bright pink robes with bright red lipstick. She immediately spotted Hannah and said, "Hannah! Darling! I've missed you!" She came over and engulfed the poor girl in a smothering hug. Hannah looked as it she was going to cry.

"Now onto the lesson!" she said after a few minutes. She wrote her name on the board with chalk and started over explaining every little thing on the first couple of pages of the textbook. It was almost as boring as History of Magic. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Charlie trying desperately to stay awake because, unlike History of Magic, this class is actually quite important.

After quite a long time, class ended. Unfortunately for Hannah, she was called back. I waited for her outside the door and a couple of minutes later she practically sprinted out the door. I reached out and grabbed the back of her robes, only to trip her and have me fall on top of her. Wonderful. I rolled off of her, only to have her groan loudly. Luckily Professor Pierell was nowhere in sight.

"Ow."

"Obviously," I retorted to her comment.

"That wasn't very nice!"

"I never said I was nice." We got up and started walking towards lunch in the Great Hall.

"Yet people think you're the nicest girl of them all!"

"Ha, what have you been smoking lately?"

"You don't want to know," she said, grinning like the Cheshire Cat. We walked into lunch and sat down next to Monica and Chaki, who were giggling.

"Okay why the giggle fest?" I asked, curious as to what had gotten these two to giggle. Monica giggles sometimes, but I can literally count on half my hand the times I've seen Chaki giggle. Laugh maybe, but never the girly giggly giggle.

"Well, we were talking about History of Magic," Monica said before erupting into another fit of giggles.

"Spill it before I hurt something," Hannah threatened menacingly. Great, _now_ she decides to be evil. Not way back when she could have helped me smack Charlie across the head a few times.

"Well," Monica said, grinning a half smirk-half grin, ya know, one of those 'It's-so-funny-and-amusing-but-I-have-to-hold-in-my-laughter-all-while-looking-like-the-professional-I-really-am' smiles. "There was this really cute guy, who just happens to be a year older than us, and also just happens to be named Edward," she paused, letting it sink in that she was talking about Edward Vogel, the hottest Ravenclaw in the whole school. His fan club could rival Charlie's, and let me tell you, the girls that mobbed Charlie in the hallway today were merely the tip of the tip of the iceberg. Edward was also the nicest and sweetest guy.

Good ol' Eddie had blackish brown hair and dreamy brown eyes that I even took a second glance at. And I never look at anyone twice, unless of course I have a crush on them. I shall never be one of those girls who will follow people around just because of what they look like. See if half the girls really knew what Charlie was like, they'd run as far away form him as they could. Instead they sit and stare at him like he's all that or something.

"…and he asked her out!" Now the three of them burst into giggles. Oops. I should have been paying attention there. Instead I was thinking about Charlie Weasley's fan club. Why the hell is he ALWAYS in my thoughts! Grr…I'm so mad at myself I could shoot something.

Suddenly something came in contact with my head. It was Hannah's hand.

"You look like you're going to kill something. You don't have a crush on Edward do you?" Chaki asked me, concern written on her face.

"Huh, no. I've never even talked to the kid. Sorry I'm just spacing out. I need to pull myself together. So what happened, you were all giggly before?"

Chaki's face lit up and she happily relayed the message that Edward had asked her out. I smiled at her and congratulated her and then I gave her some advice. Yeah, advice from me, whatta loada crap.

"You gotta call him Eddie," I said, giving her my advice. You should always make up nicknames for your boyfriends. It pisses them off to no end. Like I went out with a guy for about a week in third year and I had the most creative name for him. I think it was Jimmy-Bean. Heh, I think that's one of the reasons he broke up with me. The others could have been Eric practically stalking him because I'm his baby sister. Though actually I'm the older twin, by three minutes! I HAVE POWER!

"Eddie?" she questioned.

"Yea, Edward so boring, and it's so old. Just trust me. And if he doesn't like it, when you get pissed at him you can call him that. Though I think Eddie'll go over better than Jimmy Bean did…" I said, trailing off in thought.

"Ahh look at the lovely ladies and the ferocious beast," a cheery voice came from behind us. We were eating at the Gryffindor table, like we do every lunch. We have a schedule worked out. Ravenclaw is breakfast, Gryffindor is lunch, and Slytherin is dinner. With the exception of the welcoming feast, we always stick to this. Even with boyfriends throughout the years, we've stuck to this.

Oh, I remember when one of Hannah's boyfriends tried to get her to eat all her meals with him. We hung him from his toes in one of the rarely used corridors. We used a special spell so the string wouldn't come undone while he was hanging there. It was quite amusing to hear his shrieks. I don't think he and Hannah ever really broke up, because he never spoke to her after that.

I looked up and went, "Huh?" I turned my head and my face was again an inch apart from Charlie's. I flew backwards of the bench and shrieked. Yes I shrieked. Very scary. Hannah started laughing really hard, but luckily the rest of the school was too busy wrapped up in conversation to notice. I collected myself from off the floor, and sat down without even doing anything to Charlie.

Monica seemed to be the only one who wasn't surprised because she probably noticed the guacamole sauce sitting on the table. See, Dumbledore decided that for the first week back we would be trying foods from other countries. Anyway, she was the only one who I had told the amusing story of how Charlie had found out he was allergic to guacamole.

So I picked up the plate of it, yes it was on a plate instead of a dish, don't ask why, the house elves can get a bit creative sometimes, and shoved the whole thing in Charlie's face.

"You might want to go to Madam Pomfrey about that Charlie. You know how allergic you can get to guacamole, and we wouldn't want our spectacular seeker to get injured a week before practices begin," I said, all while smiling very sweetly. He looked very funny covered in guacamole.

"It…itches…" and with that said he dashed off towards the Hospital Wing.

"That was just cold," Eric said, apparently not amused by my antics.

"Oh C'mon Eric that was hilarious," Hannah said, for once not blushing. Eric blushed and mumbled something, but I was too pleased with myself to pursue it further.

The only thing that was worth mentioning is that Mr. Bartle hit on Chaki in Care of Magical Creatures. Again. I swear that man has an obsession with her. He also asked me how my mom was after class. Weird. Very weird. Mr. Bartle is a very disgusting old man. He's like fifty years old and he always acts like he's a little bit drunk. He's a pedophile and he has a daughter for whom I feel really bad for because of her annoying father. I think Mr. Bartle is higher up on the list of least favorite teachers of nearly everyone in the school.

The day wrapped up into evening and the week slowly progressed, homework piled on top of quidditch and soon we found ourselves staring at Halloween. And Halloween this year meant a ball.

**Yessiree! That was a SUPER FAST update. I have no idea where the whole Eddie and Chaki thing came from, it just flew form my fingers. Anyway, I'll try to update soon and not skip a few months in between updates. Oh yes, and the comments made by some of the characters actually 'belong' to my friends (the roaring monster in my closet was bugging me about using her shirt). So it is not only my genius that comes up with these things. Heh. Me a genius. How AMUSING. Please don't hurt me for the title, I was out of ideas. Hmm I wonder what the look on her face is gonna be…**

**I don't own a thing.**

**Okay so I'll get to work on chapter five, seeing as that school ends in another six or so days. Then I'll be free THE WHOLE SUMMER!**

**WOOHOO!**

**Ashy OUT!**


	5. Free Mudbaths are Amusing

**Free Mudbaths are Amusing**

"_You did not just shove my mattress out the window" –Monica Lanchez_

Dumbledore did it again. He went off and pulled one right out of the closet of ways to torture students. Apparently, sticking with the whole muggle thing, we have to dress up like muggles. But the bad thing is that it's a masquerade party that we had assigned dates too. Yay. Of course you couldn't tell who your date was until the strike of midnight.

We were all given plain black masks and were told to alter them to match our costumes. Then once we got to the ball, the masks would activate or something and we would be drawn to our dates. I think I'll just wear my uniform or something. Hopefully my date won't be too upset.

Nah. Dress to impress! That's good ol' gramma's saying. Yeehaw! Now that's Professor Pierell's saying. Yep, she's from America. I think somewhere in the south? Boston, Texas? Yea that's it. Boston is the capital of Texas. I think the Houston Tea Party happened in Massachusetts, though I could be getting this all wrong. Geography isn't really my strong point.

Anyway, the ball is in two weeks and we get a Hogsmeade weekend before. Conveniently the clothes shop just got in a new order of clothes that are styled from three hundred years ago. Perfect.

I was lounging outside by myself. Hannah and Monica were off owling prank letters to random students and teachers and Chaki was in the library actually doing her homework. So I was all alone sitting by the lake.

Suddenly, across the lake, I saw a figure walking. Then a pink figure was running up quickly behind. I heard a loud yell when the pink figure collided with the dark figure and a loud screeching commenced.

"OH SNAPEY I GOT YOU LETTER AND I HAVE TO SAY I LOVE YOU TOO!" I think that's Professor Pierell. You see, it seems as if Pierell has developed a little crush on Snape in the past few months. Of course, being like Carrie, she swears it's love.

I felt something pull at me from my pocket. I grinned and pulled out a compact mirror. It was green and had a fox on it surrounded by deep purple roses, you know, the color red ones get when they dry up and die. I used to have them be white but then I watched a dozen roses that my dad got my mom shrivel up into a deep purple. I fell in love with the color and I changed it. Anyway I opened it and where there should have been makeup, there was a mirror. The one on the top part had purple behind it, the one on the bottom had light blue on it, and there was one that slid out from behind the top mirror that was red.

I opened it and three faces appeared. Hannah looked half sleep, while Chaki and Monica looked excited. I grinned; assuming what had happened across the lake was due to them.

"You sent a letter?" I asked them.

"Yup," Monica said, her grin widening to impossible sizes.

"Carrie's next," Chaki said, highly pleased with herself.

"When you send one to Carrie, make sure you include about how much he wants her to be a vegetarian. She's to dumb and way not perverted in that kind of sense to get it. How is she gonna get that vegetarians don't like sausages?"

"All I know is that you three are planning something evil and Ashley is being perverted. Again." Hannah said, finally starting to wake up.

"Hey! I'm not that perverted!" I said in defense of myself.

"Great, now you're talking to your compact mirror. What has this world come to?" a voice behind me asked.

I whipped around and shut the mirror while shoving it behind me.

"I didn't do it, I swear!" I said, the automatic response flew out of my mouth whenever I was caught doing something that was odd.

Charlie stood there with a highly amused look on his face. I glared at him and stalked past him, blatantly ignoring him. But does the boy get a clue? No, he's way too thick. Yea, I bet he wouldn't notice if I went up to him and kissed him on the lip.

Well, he might actually, but I won't try that.

"Are you and your friends going to Hogsmeade?" he asked me. I stopped and turned to face him.

"Yea, and why do you care," I said icily. At least I think I said it icily. I like to think that I can control my tone of voice. Although I could be wrong.

"Hey don't be an ice queen!" HA! Proof. "It's just that I am sick and tired of Eric's complaining and since you seem to be the person that deals with this kind of stuff well I wanted to ask you," he said, a slight concern on his face.

My face relaxed and I smiled. Wow, never thought I'd actually allow myself to smile at him, even though it was one of those fake ones.

"Yea, that would be good for them. I think Chaki is going with Eddie, so that leaves Monica, you, and me to pull this off. I need to talk to Monica about planning, so I'll get back to you," I said and I took off in a run.

"Practice at six!" he yelled after me. Great Quidditch practice, just what I needed right now. Oh well. I stalked back to the Ravenclaw tower, where I was currently camping out. The Ravenclaw common room is really cool. They have a bookshelf in there that gives you a book to read that with keep you the most entertained. It's odd, but very useful.

So I went in and up to the sixth year girls dorms and plopped down on the green poof couch there. Hannah said she claimed this because it was green and that made it Slytherin, but then I said I could claim the red poof couch because it was red and that made it Gryffindor. That shut her up, so now she puts them both together and sprawls across them and I have to hurt her before she moves.

I nodded off and the next thing I knew was a lump landing on me.

"Owwww," I moaned, and I heard a giggle a few feet away, and I immediately knew it was Monica. I performed my slick operation, where I just got up and threw Hannah off me. Now she was the one on the floor moaning. "That's what you get!" I announced.

"Hey Ashley, can I talk to you for a second?" Monica asked me.

"Sure!" I said brightly. I walked over to her and dragged her down the stairs, out of Ravenclaw, and all the way to the Room of Requirements. I shoved her in and stared at her, waiting for her to start.

Monica looked at me nervously and then began whilw twiddling her thumbs. She does that when she's nervous sometimes, "Well, there are these two guys, both equally great in themselves, but I can't decide which one to go to Hogsmeade with." She looked at me for guidance. Now normally she would ask Chaki, but Chaki was wrapped up in Eddie, and Hannah, well that will take some explaining. Hannah isn't the best person to go to for relationship advice.

Hannah is the kind of person who will tease you before she gives out advice. Her advice is actually quite good, but you have to get her to be serious. They only time I got her to be serious was when I burst out into tears. Anyway, I remember way back when I had my first boyfriend, Jim, or Jimmy-bean, every time I was near him, you could expect Hannah to go all 'awww, that's so cute.' Very annoying. So I could see why Monica would go to me.

"Which one's hotter?" I asked.

"Ashley!" she said, slightly offended and annoyed.

"Monica, if you can't decide on their personalities, then go with the looks. Then if you still feel bad, you can tell the other you'll go to Hogsmeade with him next time. Or you could play sick," I said with a wink. Monica coughed the fakest cough I had ever heard and then grinned at me. I grinned back at her and we went back to the Ravenclaw dorms.

The rest of the day flew by and before you know it, it was time for Quidditch practice. Hannah, Monica, and Chaki decided to watch us practice. Charlie was a bit skeptical, seeing Monica was a chaser for Ravenclaw, but a quick puppy eyed face from me won him over.

Practice went well until one of the bludgers I was smacking around went astray and crashed into the stands, just to the right of Hannah.

"A little more to the left next time, Ashley," Charlie said as he flew next to me.

"If it wasn't for the fact that we're fifty feet off the ground I'd seriously consider maiming you right now," I said as I glared at him.

"Oh, but you'd only be considering, see it would hurt you too much to completely destroy this beautiful face," he said, smirking back at me.

I started giggling, and I nearly lost my balance. I flew to the ground and burst out in complete laughter, laughing so hard that my stomach started hurting. When I finally stopped, I noticed the entire team standing in front of me. I pointed to Charlie, who was right in front of me and spoke.

"He said his face was beautiful," and I started giggling again.

"Hey!" he said, looking slightly hurt.

"You know, she has a point there," Terrence McDoogal, our keeper and in seventh year, one year ahead of me, Charlie, Eric, and all the other sixth years in our year, said and walked away laughing. Two of the chasers and Eric followed, leaving me with Michelle Talken, a girl two years behind us, and Charlie.

"I think your face is beautiful Charlie," Michelle said, grinning at him. Michelle has had a crush on Charlie even since she started school, although she wasn't as open about it as Carrie was. If she was, I might have to actually pity Charlie.

"Yea, but your opinion doesn't count," Charlie said, annoyed. He got up and stomped off towards the locker rooms. Hannah, Monica, and Chaki finally decided to come down to see what was going on, and Michelle ran off, probably to cry a little. I relayed this information to them three and I ran off to find Charlie.

I found him when he was coming out of the boys' locker room. I stomped up to him and pulled back my arm. Then I sent a punch flying straight into his face. He stumbled back at him and I glared at him with fire in my eyes as I spoke.

"That was for being and incredible jackass," I turned and stomped off, up to Ravenclaw where my friends were heading. When I got there I was seething. I was so mad, I think it was borderline unhealthy.

It just pissed me off. Well, he just pissed me off. He knew, HE KNEW, that Michelle had feelings for him. I know it took a lot of bravery on her part to say that, but he just threw it away like it didn't matter! Oh sure, I don't expect them to ever be a couple, but at least he could be a little nicer. What he did was really mean.

"Ashley, are you okay? You look like you want to murder that pillow," Monica asked, concerned because she had never seen me this mad before. Hell, I don't think I'VE seen me this mad before.

And that bastard was the one who did it. Here I thought he was nicer this year, and now I see what a total jackass he is! GOD. I need to hit something. I need to hit something now. Somehow, through my boiling anger, I noticed it was raining. That would mean there was mud. Now all we needed was a mattress.

I suddenly jumped up, my anger slightly dissipating, but only a little bit. I grabbed the mattress off of Monica's bed, since she also slept on a poof, well actually I dragged it off because it was kind of heavy. Then, with sheets on it and all that jazz, I gave the window a good kick and shoved that mattress out. I looked out and watched it fall down, imagining Charlie falling, along with all my anger.

"You did not just shove my mattress out the window," Monica said, a little agitated.

"Yup! I did!" I replied grinning. I suddenly occurred to me that if anyone saw the mattress, we'd be in trouble. "Hurry! Get into your bathing suits! We gotta get down there before anyone finds that mattress!" I said quickly, while running over to my trunk and pulling out my green bathing suit. I think people call it a tankini. It's like a bikini, but there's suit to cover your stomach. I dashed into the bathroom, changed, dashed out, and breathed a sigh of relief, when I saw them all changed into their swimsuits. Monica had a purple one like mine, except a different style, Hannah had a deep red bikini, but the bottom was shorts, and Chaki had a one piece.

We all ran down out side, ignoring the strange looks people were giving us, and right to the spot where the mattress should have been. Luckily it still was there and I dragged it to the edge of a hill.

"Now this is way better than stairs," I commented, as I surveyed the hill. Did I mention that this hill was very steep? The hill ended when it fell over a slight cliff of about two feet and into about five feet of water from the lake. Because it was still pouring out, we were soaking wet the minute we stepped out the door, the hill was coated in a thick layer of mud. I sent up the mattress at the top and lined it up so the rider would get them maximum air time.

I grinned and yelled at the top of my lungs while I was sliding down the hill, "BON VOYAGE!" And with that I flew off the mini cliff and into the water.

The water was actually warm, which was to be expected seeing as it was pouring out.

"Hey! C'mon we want a shot!" Hannah said very loudly from atop the newly christened Mt. Free Express Mud Bath. You know the hill should put up advertisements. Everyone would go for it. I can see it now! 'Free mud bath! Improve your skin! It only takes 10 seconds! You will be a flawless beauty!' Then the cheesy Barbie doll girl would appear and start talking about how awful her skin was and then she went for a roll and now she's perfect. Oh yes…the evil perfect things that appear on muggle TV. They should have their own race. I think there's a cult for them out there. Yes that's it. And they prey on poor unsuspecting girls.

You see, they find a girl who's an individual, and a deemed threat, and then the leader sticks her arm into this poor, poor individual and POOF! Instant clone. They probably have a book out there about how to make a clone in ten seconds.

Of course there's the evil scientists who inject themselves with an alien that crash landed on the planet 2000 years ago to see what happens, so lets not delve too deeply into the subject.

I finally got the mattress up the hill, and we spent the next half hour sliding down the hill. Then Monica made the biggest mistake of her life.

"I bet you want to do 'special things' with a special red head boy named Charlie on this mattress, ay?" she said jokingly.

Suddenly all my anger toward that…that...fiend…returned. I wordlessly tackled her, which sent her into Hannah and caused a mass confusion. Suddenly we were all sliding down the hill. Somehow the mattress had gotten in front of us, which slowed us considerably, so much that we didn't fall into the lake. The mattress did, and the giant squid that lived in the lake decided to make an appearance. It grabbed the mattress and disappeared from sight.

"My…mattress. ASHLEY!" a livid Monica screamed at me. I jumped up, and started scrambling up the hill. I finally made it, after much work, with Monica right on my heels. I took off for the castle, and luckily it was still raining, so the mud was cleansed off.

Well, I made it to the castle alive. Can't say much about the inside. See, right in the middle of the entrance hall was Charlie and Eric. Charlie looked a little upset and Eric seemed to be consoling him.

"MOVE!" I yelled at them as soon as I caught sight of them. Eric, whose back was facing me, turned and widened his eyes as I came crashing into him. This motion caused Eric to fall forward into Charlie. Monica toppled onto me, as did the other two.

"This is…odd," Eric said as he commented on his place in the pile. I heard Monica sneeze from up above. That couldn't be good. She might get even MORE mad at me, if that's possible.

"What is going on here?" the very stern voice of Professor McGonagall asked. I looked up and smiled my 'I'm totally innocent, I'm just the poor, abused, neglected victim' look. She gave me her stern look and helped us all up.

A few hours later, and a few lectures later (WHAT WERE YOU THINKING!) and after the extreme begging I gave to Monica, I was safely snuggled into the poof with a nice warm, soft blanket wrapped around me, and I was dressed in my favorite pjs. They consisted of large t-shirt that said 'If at first you don't succeed, the skydiving isn't for you' and a pair of Eric's boxer sthat he never had worn.

The boxers were from his obsession with the muggle game Final Fantasy and there creatures happened to be from the seventh game. I think they're called Chocobos, but THEY ARE SO CUTE! Oh I need to restrain from squealing. Really, people would think I was a pig or something.

Well I can feel myself drifting off to sleep so…goodn……….

**SNORE Well the first part was sort of forced, but from Quidditch practice on I found my muse! My lovely angel coos Okay. Enough of that. So THANK YOU ALL OF MY REVIEWERS! I really appreciate it. Though I should probly do that…hmm.. Well ill see you next time and hopefully I'll get to Hogsmeade and what not. I suppose I could have made this chapter longer but… oh well**

**Oh yea and if you're not like me and aren't totally obsessed with FF7, here's a site that has a decent picture of a chocobo. I suppose you could always google it, but what fun would that be?**

**http/members. OUT**


	6. Attack of the Mysterious Blob Thing

**Chapter 6: Attack of the Mysterious Blob Thing **

"_If you even think of going back in there, I will make you regret when your mother told your father that Bill looked lonely and needed a sibling. And then I'll stop being nice." -Ashley Yata_

Okay. So the week had flown by, and I hadn't spoken one word to Charlie. It would be nice if I never have to speak with him again. But I have to, considering if we're supposed to arrange something at Hogsmeade. And it will only be us, considering what happened to Monica after the whole mattress escapade.

Apparently she came down with a particular nasty bug that's caused her to stay in the Hospital Wing all week. She's also been forbidden to go to Hogsmeade, which REALLY sucks, considering this is the only time to get our costumes for the whole 'mystery ball' thing. Oh well. The three of us will probably go to the costume store, buy a black dress as a base, and get a bunch of different shaded purple pieces of fabric and make a costume.

Stupid, but I really don't care.

It was Saturday morning, and I went down to breakfast alone, I actually got up first for once. Normally it was Monica, Chaki, me, and then Hannah last. But seeing as Monica was in the Hospital Wing, and Chaki was really tired last night for some, ahem, _odd_ reason, that left me to rise the earliest.

I was alone, until I saw Michelle run up to me.

"Hi Ashley!" she said bouncily.

"Uh, hi?" I said, confused as to why she was this happy.

"Hey, you don't have to be mad at Charlie anymore!" she said, still happy. Michelle was usually happy and bouncy, but she was also a big gossip, though what does that have to do with anything? And how does she know I was mad at Charlie?

The confusion must have shown on my face, because her smile only widened.

"Well, I heard you socked him in the side of the face and yelled at him pretty good, so I figured you were pissed. And I am touched that you're concerned for me, because that's what friends are for right? But he actually came up to me and apologized, and he told me why he was annoyed, it's cause he-"

"And what a lovely morning it is!" I heard a voice come from behind me, identified as Charlie's. He came up and stood next to me and glared at Michelle.

"He what?" I asked, this was actually interesting.

"It's nothing, anyway you promised Michelle," he said to her, a little hurt.

She frowned, "I know, but," she sighed, "Fine. I won't tell. Even though it would help things."

"No, it would probably hinder things." He said, frowning. What are they talking about? This is so confusing! Grr…that's one thing I hate, people talking about stuff I have no clue about.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Nothing," he said shortly. Okay, I couldn't get mad at him when he uses that tone. Damn. I could tell he was annoyed. Oh well. I shrugged.

"Well I'm hungry, so I'm going to go get food, you guys coming?" I asked them.

"No, I had breakfast already, I gotta go get ready to go to Hogsmeade," Michelle said as she shrugged.

"Well that leaves you," I said to Charlie. He shrugged in annoyance and started walking. How rude, he didn't even wait up for me. Geez, am I really that awful? Heh, probably. We walked in silence, until the Great Hall was in sight. I decided to say something to him.

"You know what, you remind me of a squirrel," I said after a few minutes. He just looked at me like I was crazy.

"Okay, I think you've officially gone crazy," he said, still giving me the funny look.

"That happened a LONG time ago. Plus, if you squint really hard, dye your hair brown, and shrink you down about five feet, you could really be a squirrel!" I said, smiling. Actually, I was just trying to get him out of the bad move he was in. I mean, I hate it when anybody was sad. It made it seem as if the world was ending. It also makes me feel as if I was the problem.

You see I have major guilt problems. Anybody can easily guilt me into doing stuff with them or for them. Hannah does it all the time. It's quite annoying and I know when I do have kids, they will be spoiled. Unless, of course, I find a guy who isn't easily manipulated, and I've never met one that couldn't be manipulated. It's seriously funny to get people to do what you want. The problem is to get them to not get you to do what they want.

We reached breakfast and I sat down at the Gryffindor table with Charlie, I didn't want to sit alone. That's all it is, I swear. Wait, why am I defending my choices? That's odd, oh well.

"SoareyougoingtoHogsmeadetoday?" Charlie mumbled at me. I was startled out of my deep thought from the noise of his voice.

"Huh?" I asked, confused as to what he said. See, I didn't hear it too clearly. My ears are bad, it has nothing to do with spacing out, not at all.

"Nevermind."

"Hey, Tell me! This is the one time where I actually am interested in what you have to say."

"Hey!"

"Well most of the time words come spewing out of you mouth, and then, ten minutes later, you actually process what you said," I said smartly, giving him my evil grin.

"That's creepy," he said matter-of-factly.

"What is?" I asked, slightly confused as to what the hell he was talking about.

"Your evil grin," he said smirking through a mouth of food.

"Hey! It's supposed to be creepy! And you talking with food in your mouth has somehow lost me my appetite, so I'm going to go attempt to wake Hannah out of her Eric stuffed dreams."

And with that I got up and left the Great Hall. I felt kind of bad, just leaving him there, but oh well, he'll get over it. I walked back to Ravenclaw, and met no one on the way. It was strangely odd.

On a totally random subject, you know those smelly hand lotions muggles have? I really wished for one right then. Just because. I had some in my trunk, really good stuff that was scented as warm vanilla sugar, but I didn't use it all that often, because, c'mon, in all the romantic stories the girl either smelled like flowers or vanilla. And if I'm ever going to get some sort of meaningful relationship with a guy, not my normal flings that always end badly, I don't want to be like everyone else and smell like vanilla. But it smells so good. Oh well, maybe just this once…

I finally got to where I was going and I saw that only Elena had gotten up. I remember a time where we actually were friends, but that time was long forgotten. In fact Elena was the one who introduced me to Monica and Chaki. They were already friends so I was added into the group.

Then came Hannah. For some reason Monica and Hannah seemed to know each other and were sort of friends. Not like we all are now, but friends all the same. But I became better friends with Hannah when she was hanging out in Gryffindor with her best friend at the time, Adrianna. It was creepy how they would do everything together. Well I think it started when Adrianna blew off Hannah to go off with Carrie somewhere and I was talking to her for the whole night.

I don't think Hannah ever forgave Adrianna for blowing her off, but now she was in our group. We're a tight knit group and I think it's been that way ever since second year, since we all became friends.

A loud yawn erupted from the red poof and I grinned. I walked over to it and plopped down, putting all my weight on the person below.

"Ahhh a nice comfy poof couch!" I said happily.

"Geroofmeifyavalueyerlife," a voice came from beneath me. If it's possible, my grin got wider.

"Oh what now? It speaks?" I asked, pretending to be puzzled.

"Yes NOW GET OFF!" and with that Hannah threw me off her. I was laughing loudly the whole trip down to the floor. Surprisingly, Chaki slept right through this, snoring away. She doesn't normally snore, so she must be really tired.

Hannah had already gone to the bathroom, so I took liberty of waking Chaki up.

"Chaki, hon, you need to get up," I said as I gently shook her.

"Wha?" she mumbled, still half asleep.

"You need to get up, it's nearly ten, don't you have to meet Eddie somewhere at eleven?" I asked her. Her eyes immediately snapped open and she leapt up and ran passed Hannah, who had just come out of the bathroom, ready for the day that lay ahead of her. Heh, what a day it would be.

"I think she'll be fine by herself, don't you think?" Hannah asked me. I nodded and we linked arms and proceed towards the Great Hall, where they were hopefully still serving breakfast, seeing as I didn't get much because of Charlie. He seems to be popping up a lot lately doesn't he? Well, I guess he's okay, I mean he's not as I bad as I once thought. If he keeps going at the pace he's going, I can seriously see us being friends in ten years.

We got down to the Great Hall, and were disappointed that there was no breakfast. Oh well, I'll just stalk Eric and mooch something off of him. I mean nobody can resist my puppy dog look; it's just too cute and loveable.

Charlie and Eric seemed in a deep conversation while standing near the front door. They were having a conversation, probably about Hannah, the way Eric was blushing. Charlie started laughing and no one seemed to notice the carefree attraction he had right then.

Oh no.

This will not happen. I refuse to go to the Dark side. I refuse to become one of those evil little stalkers who stalk guys around and obsess over every little detail. Okay, so maybe he wasn't that bad, but I will not turn into one of them. I. Will. Not. _Ever._

During my fuming period, I lacked to notice that Charlie and Eric had made their way over to us and Charlie was talking. From the looks of it he had just finished.

"Huh?" I said, snapping out of my daze. Charlie put a mock hurt on his face, but I could tell he was joking, the little signs, such as an amused look twinkling in his eyes.

"Why my heart has been torn out and stomped on, oh the pain of this cruel world," he dramatically put the back of his hand to his forehead accompanied with a dramatic sigh.

"You'll get over it," I stated simply. He mumbled something about the cruelty of it all. "Hey Eric," I said and turned to him, "Do you want to come to Hogsmeade with me and Hannah? I know you'll have to bring him," I said pointing at Charlie, "But it would be really fun with three people and a moron instead of just two people."

"Okay that sounds fine," he said, grinning. I grinned back. Part one of the Smoochies plan was a success.

"Hey!" Charlie said, interrupting my thoughts.

"What now?" I said, pretending to be annoyed.

"I'm not a moron!" he protested.

"Of course you're not, not all the time. You have your moments, where you actually act like you have something other than air between your ears. You wonder why you have an abnormally large fan club? It's not only because you're hot, well some of them are in there for that, but it's also because you're kind, sweet, and every other thing we girls look for in a guy, even the random bouts of moronicness that seem to fill up most of your day. Now enough inflation of your ego, let's get going before Filch hangs us."

And without further ado, I walked right past him and out the door. Hannah followed, laughing and I'm pretty sure Eric had an amused smirk on his face. I turned to face the stunned and blushing Charlie.

"Coming?" I asked, smirking.

"Uh, yea," he said, his ears still bright red. Hey look, his ears match his hair, how amusing. He followed me out to the carriages with Hannah and Eric. The four of us boarded the carriage and we were off.

The ride was surprisingly silent. Well I didn't talk, and neither did Charlie, which was surprising, considering the amount of gabbing he usually does. Hannah and Eric didn't say anything, they were too busy worrying over what the other thought. It was quite amusing to watch. They were seated across form each other and would occasionally look at one another and when one noticed the other looking, they would both look away and blush. It was super cute, yet very corny. The tension is amusing, but seriously get over yourselves and hook up already!

I grew tired and annoyed watching them, so I stole a glance at Charlie and looked out the window. I just don't know about him. I mean, I don't think he's as bad as I once thought he was. It strange how your opinion of a person can change over such a sort period of time.

The carriage came to a halt and we climbed out.

"Hey lets go to the Three Broomsticks first!" I suggested after a couple of seconds.

"Why?" Hannah asked suspiciously.

"Because I'm thirsty, that's why," I said as I challenged her with a menacing look. She just shrugged and started off towards the pub. Damn, my menacing looks never worked on her. Well, they worked on other people. She must be immune to my stupidity. Part two complete.

We walked into the pub and sat down at one of the wood tables and ordered drinks. It was now time to put part Three of the Smoochies plan into action.

My face grew a concerned look and I turned to Charlie and asked, "Hey Charlie, can I talk to you outside?"

"Why?" he asked slightly confused. Now here was the hard part, convincing Eric and Hannah that I needed to talk to Charlie in private.

"Because it's something about Quidditch," I said, still concerned.

"Why not ask him here?" Eric asked suspiciously. Damn, he catches on quickly.

"Because of the captain-player policy," I said quickly, grabbing Charlie's hand and dragging him outside. I dragged him away from the pub, and while he was stumbling behind me, I thought about how badly that went. I mean really, something must be wrong with me; I'm usually much more convincing than that. I must be losing my touch.

"So what did you want to talk to me about?" Charlie asked, a little freaked out.

I spun around quickly with fire in my eyes and a glare on my face, "If you even think of going back in there, I will make you regret when your mother told your father that Bill looked lonely and needed a sibling. And then I'll stop being nice." The effect was almost instantaneous. His eyes widened and he nodded furiously. "Good. Now I'm going to go to Honeydukes to get chocolate for Monica." With that said I walked off towards Honeydukes.

When I got there, I opened the door and expected a nice smell to float out. One problem, the stupid door wouldn't open. Now that wasn't fair, it wasn't fair at all. Here I was, trying to get to a nice shop and the door was stuck closed. I checked the window and it said it was open, so I couldn't understand what the problem was. I tried the door again and it suddenly flew open, knocking me backwards.

Someone caught me from behind and I looked up and saw the obnoxious brat who shoved the door open. He was tall and had curly dark yellow hair and was Slytherin. I recognized him as Kyle Anders, a major asshole. And his hair was dark yellow, not blonde. It was totally awful looking. He sneered at me and the person who caught me and walked off.

"Ashley, are you okay?" a voice above me asked. I looked up and saw the concerned face of none other than Charlie Weasley.

"Yup!" I said brightly as he helped me up. A faint warm scent washed into my nose. Mmm that smells better than Honeydukes. I noticed I was standing there so I scowled and went into Honeydukes. Luckily the door worked this time.

The warm smell of chocolate flooded into my nose and Charlie and I walked into the store. Wait that reminds me, why the hell is he following me?

"Why are you following me?" I asked him.

"And what makes you think I'm following you?" he asked, with one eyebrow raised.

"Because I gave you glare #26, the death glare, and that scares everyone off. Not even Eric can withstand it and I give it to him so often its very surprising that he hasn't become immune to it," I said smartly with a smug grin on my face.

He laughed, what a nice laugh, and responded, "Okay, you got me, I figured I'd just follow you around because I have nothing better to do."

"I'm sure Carrie would like some company in the shrieking shack."

"Yea but that would be boring. Sluts like her are all the same, they just scratch you in hopes of leaving a mark and getting you to come back for more. It's quite annoying," he said, his nose scrunching up in annoyance. I giggled and wandered over to where they kept the chocolates that were Monica's favorites. I grabbed some that had caramel mixed with dark, white, and milk chocolate. They were really good and I could see how Monica enjoyed them. I grabbed some chocolate covered strawberries for me.

"These are really good," I said to Charlie, showing him the strawberries. He nodded, a light smile on his face.

I looked around for a bit, and saw that there was nothing else worth getting, they were out of the chocolate covered cherries, and paid for the candies. We exited the store and wandered around a bit.

"I love the fall," I said, while we were looking out at the Shrieking Shack. The colored leaves were still on the trees.

"Yea, the leaves are so pretty," Charlie said. I could tell he wasn't all that interested so I did the only thing I could think of, talk about it more.

"I heard that over in America, New England I think, they have amazing fall foliage. I think when I'm older I'll go take a trip there just to see the colors," he just gave a 'mhmm' and ignored me. Well that jut needed to be fixed. I think I'll give him a-

"No Eddie! Stop it's not worth it!" a distressed voice that I immediately recognized as Chaki's. I turned my head and saw them down a bit further, Chaki an Eddie, standing in front of a tall boy, whose hair I immediately recognized as Kyle Anders's hair. The git had his back turned to me, so I took a few steps forward to hear what he was saying.

"C'mon Chaki, I'll show you good time, then you can go running back to that nigger boyfriend of yours after, telling him about the ride I gave you." I could just see him sneering. But that comment just pissed me off. A lot. More than what Charlie did. I silently stomped up behind him and gave him a good kick right behind his knee, you know, the place where it causes you to fall over in pain.

"Now I know the whore house is in the opposite direction than where you were facing, Anders," I said coldly, "and I know you'd be welcome there. Girls who live in that place are welcome to even the ugliest and lowest people of your insufferable gender." I gave him a swift kick in the side, looked at Chaki and smiled.

"You'll regret this," the bastard muttered from the ground.

"Oh really? And what are you gonna do to the girl who beat the crap out of you?" I asked, again coldly, but this time I raised one eyebrow. He quieted right down, much to my satisfaction, after I gave him another swift kick in the side.

"Let's go," I said, and turned away, expecting them to follow me.

"Remind me never to get on your really bad side, cause I know I'm already on the not so bad side," Charlie said seriously. I hadn't even realized that he was next to me. Chaki and Eddie were behind me, Eddie comforting a very distressed Chaki.

"Oh, you'll know way before you get to my really bad side that that's exactly where you're heading. Although lately you've been moving in the opposite direction." I replied back, just as serious.

"Oh my god what happened?" Hannah asked as she came running up to us. Apparently she and Eric had finally figured out that Charlie and I weren't coming back and had gone out to investigate. She must have seen Chaki looking upset or my really pissed of face and came running.

Eric came up behind her, confusion written on his face.

"Kyle Anders," I choked out, barely controlling my anger. Her face immediately mirrored mine.

"What did he do?" she said angrily, "When I get my hands on him…" she trailed off.

"That's already been accomplished, and I highly doubt he'll tell somebody, seeing as it would be a serious blow to his pride to admit to being beaten up by a girl. Although," I said, glancing at Charlie, "He might blame Charlie or Eddie, but I'll take credit if that happens, seeing as it was me." Slowly the tempers cooled, and Chaki and Eddie decided they were going to go back to the castle for some quiet time. Heh I wonder exactly what they mean by "Quiet Time."

It suddenly occurred to me what Anders had said. He called Eddie a nigger, it surprised me to realize that he didn't have the same color skin as Chaki and the rest of us. I guess I just never noticed it before, seeing as I lived in a neighborhood where there was one other white family and they were two old people who never went outside. The rest were people from all around the world with different ethnicities. It was so cool just wandering the streets looking at all the cool shops.

But we moved when I was nine to a big house on the mouth of a river. My grandmother died and had left us the house and the surrounding land. There weren't very many people, but there was this one girl who was really nice. Her name was Phoebe Costello and she was from America. Well she was born there, but she moved to England when she was two. She had long straight blonde hair and was three years younger than me, but she was still fun to hang around with. She was muggle, so she went to the local private school. Her parents weren't really home, so it was just her, her golden retriever Jasmine, and her calico cat Chester.

So I was left standing there with Charlie, Eric, and Hannah.

"So what did you guys talk about?" Hannah asked curiously.

"Oh this and that," I said nonchalantly.

"Yea, it wasn't that big of a deal. So what did you talk about?" Charlie questioned.

"Nothing," Hannah replied shortly. I stopped walking.

"Nothing. You two talked about nothing?" My face screwed up in annoyance. Damn. Now I have to take this to drastic measures. "Charlie, I believe we have more things to discuss, not about Quidditch, but about these two buffoons." He nodded and we took off running towards the carriages. Luckily Hannah and Eric were too much in shock to follow us.

We got to the carriages that would bring back to Hogwarts, panting. Charlie started to laugh, at first it was a few heh heh's here and then and then it turned to full laughter. I started giggling, and then laughing.

"Did you see the look on their faces?" he asked, still laughing.

"Yea! I wish I had a picture," I resumed giggling. We calmed down a little and climbed into the carriage. I sighed and stretched my legs out so they were propped up on the seat opposite me. I slouched a little bit and I was comfortable.

"You are so bizarre," Charlie said as he sat next to my feet.

"Oh why thank you good sir!" I replied back cheerily. I yawned and slouched a little more, preparing to go to sleep.

Suddenly the carriage jerked and I almost fell over. Luckily my position had prevented 'me from going flying, as Charlie flew, to directly next to me. He didn't appear to be hurt, but appearances can be deceiving.

"What the hell's going on!" he asked, slightly annoyed.

"If I knew I would tell you!" I snapped back.

"We should probably sit on the floor to avoid being thrown," he suggested.

"Wow for once you have half a brain," I said pretending to be amazed.

He grinned sheepishly at me, "Oh why thank you my fai-" The carriage jerked again, cutting him off.

"Floor. Now." He nodded at me and we dropped to the floor. Another jerk came suddenly, but this time it almost knocked the carriage over. We were movig quite quickly, and I could assume what was wrong was the something was attacking the Threshals. I had never been able to see them, but Monica told me they were there. She didn't tell me how she saw them, so I guess she was probably pretty young. I wonder if Harry Potter would be able to see them when he first comes to Hogwarts. But he may have been to young when he parents died. Or he wasn't in the room. Hmm.

The ride became very jerky, the carriage door flew open and we could see that the carriage was moving REALLY fast. It would be a stupid idea to jump.

I started slipping towards the door and I let out a small 'eep'. Charlie grabbed my arm and yanked me towards him, where he was holding on with the other hand to the closed door's handle. Luckily that door was the door that never opened unless it was an emergency, and right now it needed to stay closed, so it did. When he yanked me towards him, the carriage took a turn, so I practically flew at him. I immediately wrapped my arms around his middle, and he let go or my arm to use both arms to grab onto the bar on the closed door.

With one final jerk, the carriage fell over and everything went black.

**Aaaaaaaaaaaaaan cut! Okay, wow. That took a while. I apologise for the wait and I promise the next one will come up quicker. I guess I was distracted by vacation and the general lazyness off summer. I pondered for a while about not leaving it here, but I decided to, because this is long. It may not seem long, but I don't think I've ever written a chapter this long before. Heh, yea. So I promise the next one will come out soon. Cheers! **


	7. The Aftermath

**Chapter 7: The Aftermath**

"_Well, I don't know about that anymore. She might be slipping, seeing as she forgot to do her homework a couple of days ago." –Monica Lanches_

When I woke up, everything was white. Well it was at first, and then the white slowly blended into different shades of the Hospital Wing. I blinked a couple of times, and turned my head painfully. I was sore all over.

"Oh good, you're awake," Madam Pomfrey said as she ushered me into a sitting position.

"Wha happened?" I asked sleepily.

"Something attack your and Mr. Weasley's carriage. You were the lucky one, you just passed out, probably from hitting your head on something extremely hard. Mr. Weasley sustained injuries, none of them too serious." She replied, setting up a food tray next to me.

"Charlie's hurt?" I asked panicked. Oh no! Charlie's hurt, that can't be good! Ohnoohnoohonohonohonohono…

"Sit down girl! You just woke up and you're already out of bed! I suppose you're well enough to leave, but at least have some lunch first," Madam Pomfrey commanded. I nodded and sat down on the bed and had a really bad hospital lunch.

That's one of my pet peeves. Bad hospital food. You'd think they'd give you good tasting food, seeing as you're sick and good food would lift you up. But noooo, they have to give you this crap mush that looks like it has been regurgitated. Hello! I am not a cow! I don't throw up my food and eat it! It seriously looks like someone did that first step for me.

I looked around for a trash can, and luckily there was one close by. When Madam Pomfrey's back was turned, I slipped the stuff into the trash.

"Mmmm, that was good Madam Pomfrey, can I go?" I asked, showing her my empty plate. She looked at me suspiciously and nodded her head.

On the way, I glanced over at Charlie and made a small wish that he would be okay. I mean Madam Pomfrey said he would be, but still, I was worried.

Geez, I'm turning into a bigger worrywart than Hannah. I'll bet you a galleon that the first thing out of her mouth will be 'Oh my god! Are you okay? I was so worried about you!' It's so funny sometimes to watch her. Like the time Monica had too much of the punch that I had spiked without telling anyone. She had a really bad hangover the next day and kept walking into things. Hannah was on worry overload. She was convinced Monica had some dangerous disease that would kill her in a matter of hours and kept trying to send her to St. Mungos.

I walked up to the Ravenclaw dorm, and I saw the three of them in the common room. They immediately ran over to me.

"Ashley! Oh my God! Are you okay? I was so worried about you!" Hannah said as soon as she came into hearing range. See I told you. She's the worrywart. I grinned at her.

"How did I know you were going to say that?" I asked her. She glared at me.

"But, yea we were really worried about you," Monica said and she smiled weakly.

"Yea, I think I was the one that was better off, Charlie still had injuries and I don't think he's woken up yet. By the way do you know what happened?" I asked.

"Dumbledore said something about a baby Unicorn that was frightened by something and ran out onto the road and really freaked out the Threshals. I guess they bolted and caused the carriage to swerve and jolt after every bump, and you know how bumpy that road is. I dunno why a Unicorn would freak out a Threshal though," Monica explained.

"A Threshal is an animal of the dead, only those who have witnessed death can see them. Since seeing someone die is a way of having their innocence ripped away from them, Unicorns are wary around them, as a Unicorn is a sign of innocence. So a Unicorn and a Threshal are in a sense opposites and would seriously freak each other out, when around each other. They are opposites, but they go together as well as the same side of two magnets," Chaki recited, as if reading from a book.

"Now, this is why we keep you around, Chaki, because you're so smart, you make for our lack of it," Hannah said jokingly. Chaki smiled.

"Well, I don't know about that anymore. She might be slipping, seeing as she forgot to do her homework a couple of days ago," Monica said absently.

"WHAT!" Hannah and I both yelled. Chaki winced.

"I got distracted," she said simply.

"Oh, I think I know how, rather by whom, you got distracted by," I said mischievously.

"Oh really?" she asked, one eyebrow raised.

"Yup!" I replied cheerily. Then a thought occurred to me, what am I going to do about the dress for the ball? That could prove to be a problem.

As if reading my mind, Hannah reassured me, "Don't worry Ashley. We got a dress for you, seeing as the dance is this Friday."

"What day is it?" I asked, almost panicking. I mean wouldn't you, if you had been out for more than a week? I must have missed a lot of school and that means lots of homework! I suppose I could always copy off of Chaki or Monica. I never do that, but I'm in a dire need. I know better than to copy off of Hannah, knowing her, she'll put all the wrong answers jut to screw me up.

"Oh! Come up to the room, we'll show your dress," Hannah said enthusiastically, ignoring my question completely. Oh well, it's probably Tuesday or something.

At least I know that I haven't been out that long, because Hogsmeade was the weekend before the mystery ball.

"Don't worry, you'll like it. They did a fantastic job of picking out one for me," Monica said reassuringly.

We went up to the room and Hannah pulled out the dress they got for me.

It was beautiful.

It was black. In my opinion, black is the only color that looks good on me. The straps were to go around my arms, like Jasmine's shirt in Aladdin, and that too was what I preferred. The top had thread on the front that crisscrossed, like a corset, except I knew it wasn't a corset. The skirt part was a flowy kind, and it went down to my ankles.

"Oh my god, it's perfect!" I whispered. I grinned and turned to face Chaki and Hannah, who had identical grins on their face. I tackle hugged them onto Monica's poof. Monica jumped on me so we were all in one pile of giggles.

We soon stopped giggling, when Chaki noticed it was time for dinner. We must have been up there for a while, or I just got out of the Hospital Wing later than I had thought.

We went down to dinner, and found that Eric was there early.

"Hi!" I said cheerily. He got up and engulfed me in a gigantic hug.

"I was worried about you," he said quietly after releasing me.

"Don't worry little bro, I'm okay," I said, still smiling. "By the way, how's Charlie doing?"

"And you assume I would know?" he asked, raising a thin eyebrow.

"Duh, I mean you guys a practically attached at the hip, one would assume you would know how he was doing," I said, putting a hand on my hip.

"Yes, well, he's awake now; I just got back from the Hospital Wing. He asked if you were okay," Eric said, smirking.

I just raised an eyebrow and walked over to the Slytherin table, where Monica, Chaki, and Hannah were sitting. I sat down and we started chatting about what I had missed. I noticed Kyle Anders sneering at me so I just raised an eyebrow and he stopped.

That seems to be working a lot lately. Raising my eyebrow, I mean. It's odd how a simple gesture can have so much impact on something. Heh, well I can use it to my advantage more often. Then something occurred to me.

"Hey guys, it's been a while since we've pulled something. I don't think we want the school to think that we're losing our touch, do we?"

"No that would be bad!" Monica said, as if it had dawned on her that we hadn't done anything as of late.

"Yea would should definitely do something," Chaki agreed.

"Huh?" Hannah said, as she snapped out of her daydream of staring at Eric. I swear, one of these days I'm just gonna snap and lock them in a closet.

I whacked her on the back of the head, "Stop staring at my brother! It's disgusting!"

"Hey that hurt! And he's not disgusting, he's dreamy," she sighed dreamily.

"Okay whatever, anyway we need to do something," I said.

"Let's go back to the dorm and discuss it there, so no one will eavesdrop," Chaki suggested wisely. We finisheddinner quickly and went up to our room to discuss possible pranks.

"Oh! I got a good idea!" I said after a few minutes, "We could make a wall and put it up in front of the door to the Great Hall to make it look like it disappeared. Like there was no door, and instead there is a wall. But a simple illusion charm wouldn't work because people would walk right through it. So we need an actual wall."

They stared at me for a few minutes then Hannah exclaimed, "That's brilliant Ashley! Wow, that carriage incident must have knocked some kind of smart into you!"

I glared at her for a moment bur sobered up when I was reminded that Charlie was still in the Hospital Wing. Oh I do hope he's alright. I would feel awful if he wasn't. I know Madam Pomfrey said he would be okay, but I stilled worried.

"Ashley, are you okay? You spaced off there," Hannah said, waving her hand in front of my face.

"Huh? Yea, I'm fine," I said, shaking out of my daydream.

"Thinking about a certain someone?" Monica asked smirking.

"Who?" I asked, feigning ignorance. I very well knew who she was talking about. Charlie Weasley. I have no clue how she got it in her head that I liked him, but apparently she did, and I could tell by the mischievous glint in her eye that there would be planning and I would not be a part of it.

Wonderful.

Just what I need right now, my friends planning to try to get me hooked up with the one person I don't want to be with.

"Anyway," Chaki intervened, "We need to think up a prank for this week, until the ball."

"How about putting a sign on someone's back, like the whole 'kick me' thing?" Monica suggested. BRAIN BLAST!

"YEA! How about we put one on Snape that says Warning, Explosive Gas, Do NOT Pull Finger," I said excitedly. I think this is my best idea yet! It would be so amusing to see Snape in something like that.

We discussed it further and worked out the kinks and were all set to pull it.

Pretty soon it was dark out, and we went to bed. The next few days flew by, and the homework I missed piled up and needless to say, I was swamped. Luckily I managed to get it all done, by sacrificing my sleeping hours. I know I should be sleeping, seeing as I just got out of the Hospital Wing and Madam Pomfrey insisted on lots of sleep.

The highlight of the week was watching Snape walk around with huge pink letters on hid back that were bright and bold, and spelled out the phrase, WARNING: EXPLOSIVE GAS! DO NOT PULL FINGER.

Needless to say, it was the highest form of amusement I had gotten in a very long while. I was the only one from our group around when he found out.

I have never seen someone turn that color red before.

He stuttered and glared at me, as if _I_ was the one behind it. Well I was, but that's beside the point.

Anyway, after a particularly evil glare sent my way by everyone's favorite potions master, I went to the Hospital Wing.

You know what bugs me? The fact the Snape is a Potions _Master._ I mean, all the rest of the teachers are just teachers. But he gets to be the _Master._ It makes no sense, I tell you.

As I walked in the general direction of the Hospital Wing, who did I run into? Three guesses who.

Apparently he was all healed so Charlie Weasley was walking down the corridor. Luckily it was an unused corridor and was the back way to the Hospital Wing. Why he was there, who knows? I walked up to him with a light smile on my face.

"Hi," I said. Okay kinda lame, if you catch my drift, but oh well.

"Hey," he said softly. Did I mention how hot he looks right now? Yea, once in a lifetime thing, but still…

"I never got to thank you," I said, still smiling. Luckily it wasn't a goofy smile, which would have ruined the moment.

"For what?" he asked confused. Geez, what a moron. Does he not remember what happened last Saturday?

I rolled my eyes, "The carriage incident, silly."

Oh dear god. I called him silly. I sound like a ditzy Carrie, who calls her boyfriends silly when she flirts with them,

"Oh, that was nothing," he said scratching the back of his head, like when guys are all macho and make things out to be no big deal. It gets kind of annoying. But I wasn't really annoyed.

I just smiled and moved closer to him and gave him a quick peck on the cheek. Still smiling, I walked away from him, in the direction he came.

Yes, even if it was a peck, I just kissed Charlie Weasley.

No time to worry about it now. The mystery ball thing is fast approaching, so I have to go laugh at my friends freaking out.

I hope it's not awkward between us next time we meet. Oh well, I'll just act as if nothing happened, I'm good at that.

The ball's tomorrow, so I'd better go relax, because tomorrow will be hectic.

**Short chapter, yes, I know. But you'll get over it. The next chapter will be huge to compensate. Anyway, thanks for the reviews, and please review. **

**HEY READ THIS! Okay now that I got your attention, when you review (you know you will) could you include the name of a song or two? As you may have guessed the next chapter is the ball, and I have no clue what I'm going to do for a songs and such. Anything would be helpful, THANKYOU:D **

**Did I mention how great you guys are? **


	8. The Dramatic Countdown

**Chapter 8: The Dramatic Countdown**

_Okay on the count of three, we jump – Eric Yata_

**7:00 AM**

Okay, the ball is supposed to start at seven in the evening. So here I am, and seven in the morning, staring at these bizarre creatures that I once called friends. They have now turned into shrieking…things…and somehow have an abnormally large amount of energy.

Hannah is jumping on Chaki's bed, singing 'All You Wanted' by Michelle Branch, a muggle singer. Actually she's more like shouting it. Anyway, Hannah loves that singer, and I have to admit, she is really good.

Monica is practically tearing through makeup that I never knew she had. I know she likes to play around with it, but I never knew she had so much. She's rambling about which makeup would go with which person. She's talking to Hannah, who's off in her own world, so I guess Monnie's talking to herself about makeup.

Chaki's a little bit better; at least she's not overly loud. But she does look overwhelmed, and she has a stack of hair magazines sitting next to her. She's also mumbling something, but I can't hear her because of Hannah.

Looking around, I can't find Elena. She probably got spooked by the sudden oddness of her roommates and relocated elsewhere.

That's actually a good idea. Relocating that is. If I want to get any more sleep, I'll have to go elsewhere.

You know the couch in the Gryffindor common room seems really inviting right about now.

**7:23**

Okay, so I snuck out. Well actually, it was more like I walked out while my friends were being freaks. Luckily I was wearing a long pair of pj pants, because the castle was dreadfully cold in the morning, and it was only October.

Another good thing was that I didn't run into any teachers. That was practically a godsend, because running into Snape first thing in the morning would not be fun. Especially since he'd probably deduct points for being dressed sloppy. Hey, I bet anything that anything I could possibly be wearing would be considered sloppy.

I finally made it to the Gryffindor common room and crashed down on the nearest couch. Luckily it was the comfiest couch in the castle. And I can attest to that because I've sat on all the couches, testing them for comfort.

Yes, weird, I know, but I decided I wanted to find the comfiest couch during third year, so I embarked on a great journey. Actually it was only two hours, but whatever.

So I snuggled into the couch's plushiness, and drifted into lala land.

**9:52**

"Okay on the count of three, we jump," I heard somewhere above me. I was too asleep to be able to tell who said it, but the voice sounded very familiar. Almost too familiar.

"One."

Okay so I needed to move. Quickly.

"Two."

They weren't stopping! I could hear the anticipation in the counter's voice through my half asleep daze.

"Three."

As soon as the word three was uttered, I rolled off of the couch and onto the floor before whatever they were counting for happened. Just to make it seem like I did it on accident, I quickly sat up.

"Whazz goin on?" I demanded sleepily. I rubbed my eyes and yawned and looked over to where I had been previously sleeping.

Charlie and Eric were sitting there with identical grins on their faces. They reminded me of two cute little kids who just got caught with their hands in the cookie jar. Except they weren't cute. Well actually I should say Eric looks somewhat good, cause like it or not we're twins and I look a lot like him.

Damn.

Okay, so I guess my brother isn't that bad, and neither is Charlie. Heh, he's actually pretty cute. What did I just say that? Why the h-

"ASHLEY VOLTE YATA! WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?" I cringed as I heard my full name. I have no clue what Volte means, I think its fox in some language. My mom must have been really doped up on anesthetics when she picked out my middle name.

Hannah came stomping up to me, looking very annoyed. I think she just realized I was not in the room. That's sort of annoying, that she didn't notice me for however I was asleep. Two hours about I think. I'm not too good with time.

"I've been here since like seven 'cause you people were being scary. Way to hyper for that early," I said shaking my head.

"Hey! It wasn't early!"

"Mmmhmm. Tomorrow then I'll wake you up at seven. Oh yea, you'll probably wake me up yakking about your wonderful date. Which I still don't get why we have assigned dates. I think Dumbledore's finally gone off the deep end." I said, and promptly fell back onto the couch, which luckily Charlie and Eric had evacuated.

"NO! Get up! No sleeping!" Hannah cried as she yanked on my ankle and successfully dragged me off the couch.

"Fine," I grumbled and rolled off the couch for the second time that day.

"YOU FREAK!" Hannah screamed her favorite line. I swear she is in love with that line. She likes more than she likes my brother, which is really hard to believe.

I just gave a half hearted groan when she kicked me. I tuned out her shrieking until I felt someone picking me up. I was thrown over their shoulder and guess what immediately came into my view. A rear-end. A very nice rear end.

It took a few moments for my brain to de thaw but when it did, I had a lot to say.

**10:01**

After a bit of screaming, and whacking, I was able to convince Charlie to put me down. Yes that was Charlie who picked me up, that bastard. He has a nice rear though.

Yes I did just say that. But just because he has a nice ass doesn't mean I like him or anything.

Anyway, after he dropped me on my head I whacked him with a pillow for a bit until Eric told me to stop flirting and I attacked him. After ten minutes of frenzying attack, we finally pulled ourselves together and proceeded down to breakfast.

Which is where I am now, wondering why I even bothered with this whole ball crap. Chaki had drawn up a schedule for us to follow during the day to make sure we were all perfect and set to go before the ball. The schedule started at 12:00 which meant I had about two hours to kill.

First I have to eat.

**10:18**

Eating food is a very interesting activity. It involves putting odd smelling objects into a large cavern that is the source of all stupidity and mashing it all down into this lump of mushiness using overgrown bone.

Lovely isn't it?

And yes your mouth is the source of all stupidity; otherwise the world would be a better place. Honestly with all the moronic people saying moronic things without using their brains. The normal genius uses about 10 of brainpower, while the rest of us use about 5-7 and the morons use about 2. It's very sad because we could be using that extraordinary amount of brain power to do good things, like develop a skinless banana.

Okay so a banana has a peel, but that's beside the point.

Of course, when I mention how awful it is to waste brainpower to my dear friend Hannah, she looks at me like I'm a freak, which is so not true, and tells me to stop babbling.

I have such nice friends.

Anyway, after breakfast I wandered to my favorite spot in the entire castle. It's in an abandoned corridor on the third floor, which makes me wonder how such a beautiful place could be abandoned. At the corner of this corridor, where it turns, there is a window. Of course it's not just any window, its tall and it's always clear with a beautiful view over the lake. You can even see Hagrid's hut if you look hard enough. The window ledge is two feet wide, so it's perfect to sit on. I love going there and reading, or just plain thinking.

I practically bolted out of the Great Hall, Monica calling me to wait up. I think she'll get a bit ticked, since she does that sometimes, but she'll get over it. When I finally arrived at the hallway, I crept up to the window as quietly as I could. I did this because it seemed as if there were a lot of noise, the peaceful air about it would shatter.

I settled down, leaning on the side of the ledge. You know, Charlie isn't so bad anymore. I know it's sort of random to be thinking about all this stuff, but he really isn't. I don't really recall what had made me so pissed at him in the first place.

Oh wait, yes I do. That bastard stole my first kiss.

Okay, so he wouldn't do anything like that now, but he was downright awful back in third year.

Apparently he and some friends were playing truth or dare and someone dared him to kiss me. Well guess what the slime ball did! He marched up to me in the common room and gave a huge kiss on the lips. It wasn't so bad, but what he said afterwards was.

He yelled back to his friends to see if that was good enough. I yelled and called him a bastard.

That was the last time I ever cried over a guy.

Yes, back in third year I had a monstrous crush on Charlie. I never told anyone, not even my friends, who I tell everything. I came to the conclusion that Eric had somehow found out and dared Charlie to kiss me, which caused me to not speak to him for two months after that. But of course I eventually forgave him and began a long dating streak to forget Charlie.

It took me a while but at the end of last year, I realized that liking Charlie was part of the distant past and I promptly dumped my boyfriend of the moment. I think Eric was a little relieved that I stopped seeing people, because he never approved of what I was doing. I never told him directly, but I knew he could tell. Its one of those things we have. It's just like how I can tell he likes Hannah. He's never actually told me, but I can sense it.

Well actually, anyone with a pair of eyes would be able to see it. It's that obvious.

Leaning back on the wall thinking about Eric and Hannah, I slowly fell into a deep sleep.

**12:02 PM**

I was awoken by a soft buzzing on my stomach. It took me a few minutes to realize that it was the compact mirrors that Chaki, Hannah, Monica, and I had charmed so we could communicate back in fourth year.

They were quite useful, especially since the teachers didn't suspect us because it's perfectly normal for girls our age to carry around compact mirrors. Anyway, my mirror was softly buzzing, telling me that someone had an extremely important message to give me.

I flipped open the compact and saw only Chaki's very annoyed face.

"Where are you! You're 2 minutes and 43 seconds late!" she snapped at me. I rubbed my eyes and glanced at my watch, which read about noon.

"Whatta mean?" I grumbled, annoyed that I was awoken from a nice sleep.

"You were supposed to meet us in our dorm at noon and you're late! Hannah and Monica are out looking for you!" she said, growing more annoyed by the minute.

"Okay, okay! I'll be there in a few minutes, no need to have a cow." She scowled and closed her compact. I shut mine quickly and leaped up.

The journey to Ravenclaw was long, because I went the back way, so no one could interrupt me. If I stopped to talk to someone, it would take even more time, which would seriously piss Chaki off. Of all my years as being her friend, I've learned that it is very bad to cross her.

When I finally reached our room, Chaki was fuming. Probably because I took so long, though I think I couldn't have done anything to get there sooner.

"Finally!" Hannah said, sounding exasperate.

"Okay, so why is important that I be here exactly at noon, instead of five after?" I asked, looking at them. They sat there for a couple of seconds until Monica burst out.

"Because we have so much to do! First we have to decide what exactly we're going as, and then we need to pick out hairstyles and makeup! Then we actually have to put on the make up, and do our hair! Plus it would be nice to have painted nails. It's going to take a while!" she ranted, practically in tears by the end.

"Okay?" I questioned, "But will it really take seven hours?"

"YES!" came the loud response from the three of them.

I sat back, prepared to try to enjoy the process as much as possible.

**2:36**

The past two and a half hours have been pure torture. Well, actually I was asleep for the first hour, but their yelling woke me up. When I was finally fully awake, I saw Hannah and Monica in the middle of a screaming match on whether or not to go as a group or go separately.

Finally Chaki stepped in and said it would be better to go as a group, because then it would be easier to recognize each other.

So they've spent the past hour and a half arguing about which group. Monica was convinced that there was no possible way to go in a group that worked, Hannah was upset because Monica was upset and those two have this thing where when one of them gets upset, they end up pissing the other one off, Chaki was sitting there yelling at Monica, and I was making shadow puppets with light from the end of my wand.

I made a bunny shape and started humming Little Bunny Foo Foo, you know, that nursery rhyme where the rabbit hops through the forest and decapitates all the field mice.

Suddenly an ides hit me faster than Hannah can do twenty jumping jacks. Okay so that's really slow, but you get the point.

"Hey guys," I said, but they obviously didn't hear me because they were all still yelling. "SHUT UP!" I screamed, and they actually listened to me because they were now staring at me like I was an unfamiliar UFO.

I wasn't unidentified, and I sure wasn't flying, so they obviously had something wrong with them.

"Okay, I was thinking," Hannah snorted at that one, so I glared at her, "and maybe we could go as characters from that book, The Travels of a Circle. We could all dress up like the people in the ball scene."

They stared at me again. It was starting to get creepy, them staring at me.

"Hannah can go as the mermaid princess, Monica can go as the human queen, Chaki can go as the fairy princess, and I can go as the elf maiden. See, it all works out."

"But it's a kid's book," Monica snapped.

"Do you have anything better?" I snapped back. She just glared at me. "Okay so we need modifications on out dresses, that shouldn't take too long. Hey we might even have time to do our nails!"

**5:45**

Please…someone…save me…

The past three hours have been total hell.

Okay maybe that's a slight exaggeration. Sitting in a large cavern with nothing to eat but broccoli would be hell. But this whole thing seemed pretty close.

We spent a good portion of the time altering out dresses. Since we hadn't read the book in a while, we had only a vague memory of what the dressed actually looked like, so the altering was a painfully long process. Okay so they looked awesome in the end, but that's beside the point.

As of now, we're looking at hairstyles. Chaki's all done, she'd lucky because all she's doing is a side part and straitened hair. She of course will have a tiara, probably a silver one since she's a fairy.

"Oh! What about this one for Monica?" announced Hannah as she pointed to a hairstyle. I leaned over her shoulder to take a look and I have to say, if we could pull that off, it would look amazing.

The model had shorter hair in the front that was hanging loose and then the rest was French braided until the hair was pulled into a messy bun at the bottom. I grinned and looked at Monnie.

"Yes, I do believe we could pull this off," I said eyeballing her hair hungrily. I'm sure she was pretty freaked out as we all probably looked like vultures eyeing a dead cow. I look at her thoughtfully and say, "You know, you'd be an amusing dead cow."

"What?" came three disbelieving voices. I tried to explain my train of thought, but they all juts stared at me.

"Ashley, you're babbling again," Hannah said, after I had gotten into a full swing explanation.

"I do not babble!" I said, and she just gave me an amused look. I really don't babble! I looked up the definition once and it means to talk enthusiastically or excessively and I don't do that! Okay so maybe I do talk a little too much sometimes, but still! I'm insulted that she would even bring up the topic. It's only her opinion anyway. I'm sure Eric and Charlie think I'm and absolutely wonderful person who does not babble one little bi-

"Stop pouting Ashley, you look like you're constipated or something," Monica remarked, so I sunk into even deeper pouting.

**6:12**

Okay they were getting quite frantic. Okay and I was getting a bit frantic as well. We had only forty five minutes and we hadn't even started getting ready. Okay, so we had planned everything out, but we were still in our regular clothes. Well at least I was. I drew last as to who got the bathroom to shower and change.

Monica was already done and was in her dress, which was a silky dark purple, with a crimson red over coat, much like medieval princesses. She was now waiting with Chaki for Hannah to finish with the bathroom.

Chaki looked awesome too. She had on a silvery blue dress that slowed down to her feet. She had to wear two inch heels to make sure the dress didn't get caught on anything. The dress was clingy, but not overly much. She also was waiting for Hannah to get done.

Finally, after what seemed like hours, though it was only ten minutes, Hannah bounded out in a flurry of silver. Her dress was a strapless one that sparkled at her every movement. It was also tight at the top and loosened up as you traveled south, which is something I'm sure all the boys will really appreciate.

I smiled and told her my brother would drown in his own drool and dodged her smack and proceeded into the bathroom. I was a bit annoyed that I was last and I knew they would start the makeup and stuff without me.

Okay so it didn't really bother me because I knew they needed me for accessories. You see, my mother had this thing with giving me jewelry every time she went shopping. What had resulted was a pile of jewelry that was useless to me. I never liked jewelry in the first place, but I dutifully wore it whenever I saw her.

With all this jewelry that had accumulated over the years, my friends had a wide selection of things to wear, seeing as I granted them access to my jewelry trunk. And yes it was a trunk. Of course I had everything all laid out in color order and type. My mother also had gotten me a few weird pieces of jewelry that I kept in a separate box, including five or six tiaras. Well the tiaras were from my grandmother when I went through a princess obsession when I was six.

Let me tell you a few things about my grandmother. She was really nice, made the best strawberry shortcake, and was exceedingly rich. The funny thing was that our family was one of the few rich wizarding families that weren't purebloods. My mother is muggle born and my dad is half and half. My grandmother also passed away a few years ago, so we had relocated to her house on the mouth of a river. It was a beautiful house, richly adorned in anything you could ever imagine. It was styled after American houses; I believe the style is colonial.

But since my grandmother died, my mother inherited a large amount of money, hence her buying me anything she can get her hands on. It's funny because every summer, I find my closet size doubled with all the clothes she buys. She doesn't actually send me the clothes to school like she does the jewelry, so I always act so happy. I think she buys me stuff to make up for all the time she doesn't spend with me.

I finished up in the shower, and dried off using a spell. I hear giggling from behind the door and I pull on my dress. I didn't alter my dress all that much, only to make it fit me. The elfin princess was only describes as looking particularly dark with the blondest hair ever seen. Of course she brightens up when her prince arrives. Apparently he has 'hair of the flaming torch and eyes so bold, wearing bright colors complementing the fair maiden.'

Sounds like someone we know, eh?

I unlocked the door and walked out only to see Monica's hair in a mass clump.

"Um is her hair supposed to look like a nest?" I asked Hannah.

"It looks like a nest? Oh my god Hannah I'm going to kill you! This is really important! Oh my god!" and Monica burst out in tears. Of course any sensible person would start crying as much as se if they saw what Hannah had done.

"Monica its okay, let me help you," I said frantically.

**6:34**

Okay so with a simple spell I fixed Monica's hair and set it to the way we had picked out. I gave Hannah two smacks, one for messing up Monica's hair and one for good measure. Of course Hannah was only joking; she does this when she's nervous.

Okay, so I'm slightly panicking as well, but not as much. I mean we have plenty of time. Forty five minutes in fact. It's always good to arrive fashionably late. I tell them this and I can see them visibly relax.

"Okay, if we're to get this done quickly, we need a system. Chaki, you'll get the hair, Hannah, you'll get the makeup, and I'll pick out jewelry. When it's my turn, Hannah will get the jewelry, when it's Hannah's turn, Monica will get the makeup, and when it's Chaki's turn, I'll do the hair. Okay? Okay," and with that said, we got off to work.

Within ten minutes we finished up Monica, which is totally awesome because we had very limited time. Thank God for magic, otherwise we would be in a total mess. Monica looked awesome, with her hair done perfectly and her makeup done perfectly. I quickly shot a spell at her nails and they became red to match her overcoat and swirled to the deep purple of her under dress. I had picked out darker jewelry and had set upon her head a gold tiara with red jewels. I wasn't sure if they were real, but they sure looked it.

We set to work on Chaki immediately, seeing as time was running short. Luckily she was easy to do. Her hair was perfect with the wave of a wand. I charmed her nails to a pale blue, to match her dress. Hannah also added a touch of red highlights in her hair. Not too much, but just enough to brighten it up a bit to add a greater contrast to the blue I gave her a diamond tiara that looked as if it were made up of entirely of pale blue diamonds. The jewelry was also light and made up of mostly silver.

Hannah was next. We left her hair down, and coaxed her wavy hair into soft rolling waves, much like the ocean. Her makeup was all dark, and her nails were blood red, which wasn't exactly in the description of the character but it was cool just to put it like that. Her tiara also consisted of one blood red jewel, which was in the book because it was supposed to be the jewel of the ocean and very important to controlling the ocean.

I was last. I have to admit, I looked pretty good. My tiara was perhaps the plainest, just a plain silver with a rose pattern. I did indeed look like the dark elf princess. Now wouldn't it be cool if there was someone dressed as my prince? Of course Hannah would need her secret lover who was a human. Hmmm, I wonder what Eric was going as? Chaki would need her happy prince, who was as full of laughter as she was. Or at least was supposed to be. She looked quite green as of the moment. And Monica would need the mysterious stranger who would sweep her off her feet and send her off to lala land.

I checked the clock and ushered them along when I remembered the most important part of this whole thing.

"Wait! We need our masks!" I cried. Monica ran up and got them and handed them out. My mask was pure white, Hannah's mask was blacker than black, Monica's was a deep red, and Chaki's mask was light blue, almost white.

We made our way down to the Great Hall, seeing no one on the way, which was a bit creepy because the halls are usually so busy with chatter. We finally arrived at the Great Hall and we entered. I heard a collective gasp from beside me.

All I know, is that I was defiantly swept off of my feet.

**OMG! It's done! Okay, so it's not everything I wanted to happen in this chapter, but you all will get over it. I know exactly what I'm going to be doing next chapter, so there won't be a five month wait between chapters. I apologize immensely for the wait! Please don't be mad! ))Hands out Charlie plushies.(( There. All better!)) :)Okay, so look soon for the next chapter. It will be started tomorrow and hopefully up by New Years. That's exactly what I'm aiming for. Again I apologize for the wait!**


	9. Of Llamas and Porcupines

**Chapter 9: Of Llamas and Porcupines**

_Ah yes, and I'm a galloping baboon! - Mr. Mysterious and Handsome_

It was beautiful. The hall I mean. Instead of the normal weather showing ceiling, there were shooting stars. A pumpkin floated passed me and I looked around for my friends. I couldn't see them, so I walked into the hall and was immediately pulled into this giant circle of dancers. I finally noticed the music playing in the background was a festive type, and I relaxed and started to enjoy myself.

The music then changed into a waltzy sort of thing, and all around me people were pairing off. I quickly scanned the crowd for a partner, and I realized that I knew no one. It's quite a scary revelation, not knowing anybody. I suddenly felt a tap on my shoulder, so I spun around and was immediately whisked off in a waltz.

I looked up to see who my dance partner, and was surprised to see a handsomely dressed man who looked just like Elinsa's partner. Elinsa was the character I was supposed to be dressed up as. The strange thing was that he fit the description perfectly, right down to the gold on the boots and bright red hair.

"And what is such a fair maiden doing in a place like this?" he asked me. Geez, now isn't that corny? Okay, so it's also unbelievably romantic, so much that I feel like giggling. Hehe.

"Going to a school dance," I replied. I didn't mean to sound mean, well maybe I did. But there's a physiological reason for it! I've discovered, through the use of many self help books that in order for me to find love, the star Llama and the star Porcupine had to line up in the shape of elbow macaroni.

Okay, so it wasn't self help books. It was Hannah interpreting Monica when Monica asked Professor Trelawny. During third year, Monica entered a Divination obsession, which actually got her interested in Egypt, so technically it was a good thing. Monica says she wants to be an archeologist, but I say she would make a heap loads more money singing. She retorts that it really isn't about the money and she should do what she wants, which sends me off grumbling, only to take my anger out on some unsuspecting first-year. I don't actually yell at them, more like prank them. It's nothing bad, you know, just ants in their pants, the uncontrollable urge to cry, and a different hair color.

Anyway, back to Mr. Mysterious and Handsome. Okay, I have to admit he was pretty cute. If his rear was anything like Charlie's, I'd be all set. Yes, I think Charlie's rear is nice, no I would never think of him that way. Not again. It hurt too much last time.

"Ah, so playing hard to get?" he asked, smiling still, with one eyebrow arched. I stared up at him and his red hair, trying to place them somewhere in my memories.

"Not really, just not feeling the whole dress up and have fun vibe," I replied, trying to look bored. Okay, so I didn't exactly lie, but I was feeling the fun vibe slowly creep onto me as he spun me around. As much as I tried to deny it, I was starting to have a good time.

"Ah, then we will have remedy that," he said as he spun me around into another song. I inwardly laughed, but I refrained from laughing out loud because that would mean I was having fun, and he had won. I would hold out as long as possible, until the happiness took over me.

"So, how about them Red Sox?" he said after a period of silence. What? I looked at him confusedly. He smiled at me and proceeded to explain, "The Red Sox are a baseball team from America and their home stadium is in Boston. Baseball is a muggle sport."

"Well I knew that baseball was a muggle sport because I remember chucking a baseball at my brother's best friend. It was quite amusing actually," I said reliving the time when I had gotten so mad a Charlie that I threw a baseball at him. I believe he avoided me for a week.

He laughed and said in response, "Ahh, so you're the violent type?"

"Not really, I just know some really annoying people that deserve to be smacked," I replied matter-of-factly. Because what I said was true, I did know people who deserved it. Like take Hannah for instance. She constantly goes off on these long tirades about who should be with who in our school. In fact she's convinced Monica and Chaki that I belong with Charlie, and so now all three of them have begun plotting to get us together. They think we're a match made in heaven. Yeah right. He is probably the most annoying person in my life right now.

Well okay, maybe that was a bit harsh. My fellow Gryffindor girls always take the top spot for most annoying. But Charlie ranks high up there.

"And are there lots of these people?" he asked as he twirled me around.

"Geez, what is this twenty questions?" I snapped, a little annoyed, "Not really, only a select few ever make that list. What about you? Anyone really annoying in your life?"

Okay, so it was a ploy to get the questioning off of me. I really didn't like being questioned by people I didn't know, although Mr. Mysterious and Handsome seemed oddly familiar.

"Not really," he said, seeming closed up. Then I guess he decided he could talk to me because he continued on. "There's just this one girl who's annoying beyond reason. But the strange thing is that she doesn't annoy me in the way a little kid does, she annoys me because she's so thick."

I gave him a look that said 'continue please.'

"I try to tell her subtly that I like her, but she never seems to get the clue. In fact it seems as if she hates me," he said, rather unhappily.

"Hmm, well maybe you should ditch the subtleness and tell her right out straight," I suggested after a switch in music. It was now an upbeat style, and strangely I knew all the steps. It was weird. It was like the knowledge had been placed in my brain or something. If Voldemort had found out about this before he died, he would have a field day. Planting suggestions in people's mind and causing them to know things they had not is really amazing, for that's what I recognized this as.

"I think she would laugh at me," he said sadly.

"Well you never know, she may actually be madly in love with you," I said, laughing a bit. Not too much, just enough to lighten up the mood a bit.

"Ah yes, and I'm a galloping baboon!" he said, laughing along with me.

"We-el, I'm sure I could help make the change," I said, and he spun me around, his eyes twinkling with laughter.

"So what about you? Any boy troubles?" he asked, somewhat seriously as we moved gracefully through the dance steps.

"Not really," I said, "The last time a boy gave me trouble was in third year."

"Ah, what happened?"

"Nothing big. I just had the hugest crush on him and he kissed me as a joke, which really hurt," I said, losing my happiness.

"Wow that guy sounds like a jerk," he said, his voice littered with disapproval of the younger Charlie.

"And I think I might actually like him again," I said, surprising myself. Okay so it might be true, but it wasn't as bad as third year. I mean, I suppose I wouldn't mind if Charlie came up and kissed me or something, but I wasn't about to go and run off with him or something.

"Let's hope he's matured then," he said, laughing.

We spent a good few hours just talking. It was the most amazing experience I've ever had. When we got tired we just sat down and continued on talking. And it wasn't like he did all the talking either; we were having intelligent conversations.

Although over time something weird began to happen. It seemed slowly that I was losing the sense of clarity. This seemed to increase alarmingly whenever I took another sip of my drink. It took me a while to figure out that the drink was actually spiked and that it was making me drunk. Uhoh, that could possibly turn into a problem.

Especially since Hannah says I do some pretty stupid stuff when I'm drunk.

Of course, I'm way underage to be drinking, but it was summer and we were alone with lots of firewhiskey. What else do you think we were going to do?

"Hey I think the punch is spiked," I said, suddenly unsure of myself. I mean really, what if it wasn't spiked, and I was just going coo-coo? If I do go coo-coo, I hope it's for Coco Puffs.

"Probably," he said, after taking a large gulp, "But if it is, it sure feels good. You wanna go for a walk outside?"

I think he was referring to the lovely gardens that Dumbledore had set up by the greenhouses. I had been kinda hoping my date would take me there, so now I'll get to see them. I was practically jumping for joy.

I nodded to him and we proceeded out the door. Okay, so it was more like a three story castle type-door thingy, but really, did it matter? When we finally arrived at the gardens, I noticed that he wasn't the only one with the idea of bringing his date out here.

A soft melody floated past us and I was immediately calm from the sense of impending doom that was sure to come. Okay, so maybe it wasn't that bad, but still. It was strange for me though, to be out here with so many other people. Yea, I've had many boyfriends, but we always did stuff in private. PDA was a big no-no with me. I always was uncomfortable whenever it took place, especially when it involved me. I guess it was all rebounded off of that horrid night.

Bloody Charlie Weasley.

Mr. Mysterious and Handsome must have noticed something was wrong because he pulled me close and leaned down to whisper his inquiry in my ear. Damn, he smelled really good.

"Anything wrong?" he whispered, his voice sending tingles through my body. Okay it's decided, regardless of who this guy is, I will at least try to be his friend. And that's a promise.

"Not really, I just don't like being around people when the mood is set at romantic," I said, leaning my head into his chest, still aware of all the people, feeling their eyes on me. It wasn't so bad in the ballroom because we were just talking, but out here it felt as if everyone was laughing. Okay, maybe not so dramatic, and I knew that people were too wrapped up in their little worlds to care about what was going on in mine, but the fear was still there.

"Ah, so this is romantic?" he asked with a smirk. That smirk seems real familiar...

"Why yes, good sir, it is," I replied and we both started quietly laughing, so as not to disturb the other love birds.

Whoa, backup. Did I just call the people lovebirds? The alcohol must really be getting to me. I'm really starting to sound like McGonagall. That would be a bad thing because then I'd have to put my hair up in a tight bun and walk around like there's a stick up my ass. Okay so the stick thing is more of a Snape. On the plus side it would be cool to turn into a cat. Then I could finally see where Chaki goes when she's 'studying' because there's no way someone can study that much and not go insane.

Okay so maybe she's a little screwy, but then again we all are. I suppose that because the rest of us are insane that it hides her whacko-ness. Seriously, this girl in Hufflepuff named, uhh, I think it was Tania or something, came up to her once and told her she seemed normal and proceeded to ask her what she was doing hanging out with those freaks.

The freaks meaning us. I almost laughed outright, because Chaki is anything but normal. She's just as wacky as the rest of us and that's what makes her so lovable.

While I was wrapped up in my thoughts, Mr. Mysterious and Handsome had led me away from the masses and into a lovely secluded spot in the greenhouse garden thing.

"This better?" he whispered into my ear, again sending chills through my body. I swear, if I'm this affected by his whisper, I wonder what would happen if he kissed me.

I didn't have to wait long to find out because suddenly he bent down and covered my lips with his.

By brain turned to complete mush.

It was swishing all around in my head, threatening to pour out my ears. I wrapped my arms around him and ran my hands through his hair. The lovely silky hair that was so much fun to play with. When I find out who this is, I will definitely be dragging him to an empty classroom just for the pleasure of playing with his hair.

You know, it takes a really long time to find a guy with perfect hair for running your fingers through. There's been eight guys since third year and there's only been one with good hair. And his hair was not as nearly fun as this one's.

I smiled against his lips and deepened the kiss until any coherent thought was gone.

It was like eating the sweetest strawberries in the summer. Or like getting that warm cup of hot chocolate in the winter time after a particularly amusing snowball fight. It was simply perfect, in way that nothing ever could be.

We stood there, lip locked until I was practically blue from lack of oxygen. Then we broke apart, so we wouldn't fall over or something. Of course what happened next was a new feeing for me, even though I was practically an expert in gazing into peoples' eyes.

When looking into a person's eyes, you expect to see into their soul, to see deep dark secrets of who they were. Okay, so maybe that's a bit over exaggerated, but you get the point. You can easily get lost in someone's eyes. The point is that you usually know who that person is.

So what endlessly freaked me out was that I was totally, completely, and utterly lost in this guy's eyes and I had no idea who he actually was. Okay so I knew a lot about him, but still, a name would be nice.

I mean how else am I supposed to seek him out in the hallways and flirt with him until he succumbed to my seductions? It's rare to fins such a nice guy and I swear I would take advantage of this. The only guy who is remotely nice in my life is my brother, and no thank you that's just weird. And plus he practically belongs to Hannah anyway.

Charlie, being the only other male remotely close to me other than the occasionally classmate joking I get with my guy friends, is also a no-no. He's an ass, as I believe I've pointed out many times. A very sexy ass, yes, but that's beside the point. And yes, while I may have the teensiest crush on him, I still hate his guts and I have determined that he should run away to some remote island in the South Pacific.

Yes and then maybe he would marry some island girl and he would be out of my hair. And him and this island girl would have many kids, I think about ten. And after that a volcano would spontaneously erupt and destroy their town leaving them homeless to wander about.

Okay maybe that last part was a bit harsh. And okay maybe I was rambling. And yes I admit, for a second there I was picturing the island wife a petite short haired blonde with blue eyes and a tendency to whack him. But no I don't intend on ever marrying Charlie Weasley and I will eat slugs before that day comes to pass.

A soft melody floated into our tiny little hideaway and Mr. Mysterious and Handsome backed away and held his hand out as an invitation to dance. I, of course, accepted, and we danced the rest of the night away.

**Okay! There. It's done, finally! I apologize for the month overdue from what I said, but this whole update thing is hard! I will really try to have the next one out soon, though. I even have a good idea of what I'm going to write, which is better than most of the time. Oh yes, and I would also appreciate REVIEWS! They really boost my moral and help me get my butt of the lazy chair and back to work. :) Okay so next chapter, the morning after, and we'll see if the stars are indeed lined up in the shape of elbow macaroni**


	10. The Morning After

**Chapter 10: The Morning After**

_I can't believe you would- would- **insinuate** that I would- would do something like that! - Chaki Takashi_

I slowly came into consciousness, a delicious cinnamon smell attacking my nose. It was a beautiful smell, and if I could've bottled it and sold it, I would have made millions of galleons. It was the perfect smell. And I knew it came from my mysterious date because the last thing I remembered from the night before was falling over onto him after having one too many spiked drinks. Of course, I knew that I would probably regret having so many drinks, I was beyond the point of caring.

Of course, no one actually tried anything because I would've remembered beating someone up. Because that's another thing I do when I get drunk, beat people up. I think that's the only time I ever get to actually pound out my anger on people, which is why I make sure to not get drunk a lot. I believe my victim last time was Eric, and in the morning it looked like a rabid bunch of Chocobos ran him over.

Oh yes, I bet you forgot my secret obsession with the big yellow birds. Okay so maybe they're only from a muggle video game, but I still love them. I even have pjs with them on it! Okay, so maybe I stole them from Eric, but really who's counting?

I decided that sitting up would be the best course of action, and boy was I wrong. I seemed to forget that when you get drunk, whether on purpose or not, you usually end up with a hangover in the morning. The one I had wasn't that big, but it was enough to be annoying. I would go to the Hospital Wing for a hangover remedy, but Madame Pomfrey would probably get ticked off and give a nice long lecture of abstinence in drinking. Then she would get into all the other things you can do that could possibly screw up your life forever. Like getting pregnant. I was given that lecture after I went to her when I first period.

Of course that subject brings up many amusing memories, particularly one highly amusing potions class when Pernificus the painter decided to make a showing. And yes, I admit, the four of us jokingly named all of our painters. I mean really, what else are four giggling thirteen year old girls supposed to do on the Saturday after their first Hogsmeade trip and they've stocked up on enough candy to least two hundred years? Anyway, Pernificus is Hannah's painter.

Okay so picture the setting of a very doom and gloom dungeon with the evil potions master barking out orders to all the frightened little children. Then Hannah stands up and announces quite cheerfully that she was bleeding. Professor Snape came over and asked her to show him where she was bleeding, she promptly levitated her cauldron, still filled with a half finished potion, and tried to throw at him all while screaming about how he was a pervert who was trying to get into the pants of his students.

We found out later she had a temperature of 104 and was delirious and not really in control of her actions because of a bug she picked up when her family took a trip to South America. It seemed as if the bug hid itself and decided to start causing problems for her almost three months after she had actually caught the bug.

But the look on Snape's face when having a cauldron thrown at him and being accused of seducing his students was priceless.

Back to the current matter, I still had a headache and I was starting to get pretty annoyed. I mean really, who wants to wake up after a night of awesomeness with a headache? I looked around, trying to figure out where I was, but the bright lights kept annoying me and making my headache worse.

When the big fuzzy blobs shaped up into actual objects, I looked around for a better view. It appeared that my date and I had made it back to the Great Hall and found a corner to snuggle down in and fall asleep. I turned and looked at who exactly my dream date was and I was given the shock of my life.

It was Charlie Weasley.

I mean, I must have been out of my mind last night. Charlie is the only person with bright red hair that's close to my age. Of course someone could have used a spell or something, but still, the red hair should have tipped me off. Another thing was how he talked a lot about animals. Charlie is the only person I know who still takes Care of Magical Creatures and actually enjoys it. I only take it for an easy A. It was that or Divination and Professor Trelawney is batty as hell and scares me.

So obviously since there were lots of clues pointing to Charlie, there was no way in hell that I would ever guess it was him. I mean really, Charlie? Annoying Charlie Weasley? He seemed so different than from what I actually remember of him. Perhaps it was my imagination that's made him so much of a bastard.

Suddenly he groaned, signaling that the lug had finally woken up.

"What time is it?" he mumbles, obviously unaware of his current situation and the ball the previous night.

"Time for you to get a watch," I replied, using the age old comeback to that question. Okay so it's practically the lamest comeback out there, but really, who cares? He sat up and looked around, blinking when he saw the bright lights, obviously from the hangover he got from the punch. The punch has one hell of a punch. Heh, I made a joke! A lame one though…I guess I'll have to work on that.

"Honestly, what time is it?" he said blinking a few more times. He still didn't recognize me; otherwise he would have said something.

"Honestly, I have no clue," I responded truthfully. I really didn't know what time it was because there was no clock in view.

"Ashley?" he asked. It seemed as if he was wondering if it really was me.

"No, it's the grim reaper," I said sarcastically. Of course it was me! The dunderhead. He sat up, effectively knocking me off his lap and onto the floor.

"Oh hello Ms. Grim Reaper," he said suddenly cheerful. I swear, one of these days he's gonna get it. I stood up and held my hand out to him, and when he took it I yanked him up.

It ended up that I pulled him up too hard because next thing you know we were on the floor with him sprawled across my stomach.

"Well that was counterproductive," I said, stating the obvious. He rolled off of me and we locked eyes for a few seconds. Did you know he has the most gorgeous eyes?

Suddenly, out of nowhere, Charlie started to laugh. I sent him a quizzical look and he just kept laughing. Then the world abruptly became extremely funny, which caused me to go off in a tirade of laughter.

And that's where the rest of them found us, sprawled across the floor laughing. From what I could see, Hannah had a look of glee on her face while Eric just shook his head. Only when we had finally calmed down did either of the two say anything.

"I think my dear sister's finally gone crazy."

"She went crazy a long time ago," Charlie said, causing me to glare at him.

"You were acting like a freak too," I grumbled, but it seemed as if no one heard me. After exchanging a few more words, Hannah and I proceeded up to Ravenclaw to change out of our dresses.

When we got there I saw that Monica and Chaki had already changed and were sitting on their respective poof couches and chatting.

"I found her sprawled across the floor next to Charlie laughing her head off," Hannah explained as she shed her dress and pulled on sweatpants and a large sweatshirt. I rolled my eyes and did the same, except pulling on a tight tank top. I hopped onto my poof and pulled a large blanket over my shoulders, that was adorned with the symbol of a muggle baseball team in America, the Red Sox. Okay, so the blanket actually belonged to Monica because she received it as a Christmas gift. Hannah was immediately annoyed by the garment for reasons known only to her, so I confiscated it and now used it as a cover underneath the giant fuzzy blanket I usually used.

"So before we go get chow I think we should all chat about our wonderful evenings!" Hannah said as she clapped her hands to get our attentions. "Ashley should go first!"

"No."

"Yes!"

"NO!"

"Fine then I'll start!" she said, and began her in depth explanation of how wonderful my brother was, because he was her date, and how beautiful of a kisser he was. She also mentioned that he had near perfect hair for running you fingers through. I smirked to myself, remembering Charlie's perfect hair, so soft and fluffy.

I yawned and tuned her out, because really, I had no interest in hearing how magnificent a kisser my brother is. I mean really, who wants to hear that?

"Ashley, are you even listening?" Hannah questioned, annoyed at my obvious lack of attention.

I gave her a look that obviously said NO. "I'm sorry. I just really don't need to hear how my brother's 'exotic tongue' wormed its way down your throat," I said, quoting her descriptive words, storing them for future use against her and my brother.

Hannah just glared at me and Chaki took that as a signal to start talking about her date.

"Well, he was really nice. He's a year older than us and he's in Hufflepuff. I think we talked the most about UFO's, because he's really interested in them, but then we were discussing the possibilities of the existence of-"

"Chaki, please, skip the boring stuff and get to the good stuff," I said interrupting. I had missed out on Hannah's explanations because she was talking about my brother and that was too weird to listen too.

Chaki looked at me with a slightly shocked and confused look on her face. "C'mon, tell us if he was a good kisser or not, and what was good and bad. You know, the works," I said, grinning my head off.

"I can't believe you would- would- _insinuate _that I would- would do something like that!" she said, standing up while throwing her arms up high in the process.

"Chaki, I saw you glued to someone's face when my _oh so lovely_ date decided to go get us more drinks," I said, smirking. Okay so that's a complete lie. I didn't actually see any of my friends during the ball, but judging the look on her face, I'd say I hit the spot right on.

Seeing Chaki blush is a truly interesting phenomenon. First her ears turn red. Then the blush creeps across her face until her whole face is as red as her hair. Seeing this blush was a sure sign that something had gone on, but Chaki was holding true to the old saying 'Don't kiss and tell!'

So Hannah and I grew bored with pestering her and we turned our attentions towards Monica, who started blushing the second we turned our eyes on her.

"Well, it was, um, I think it was, uh, nice?" she said, sounding unsure of herself.

I raised one eyebrow and smirked at her, "Just nice?" She blushed and did not say more. Usually Monica and Hannah were the chatterboxes, me coming in second and Chaki staying quiet and interjecting her opinion when needed. I have this theory that if she were given more of a chance to talk she would, but seeing as she's best friends with the Three Mouths, that chance went buhbye.

Of course, the one thing that Monica refused to talk about was boys. I know she's done stuff with them, I caught her once on this nifty little map we found wedged between an old couch in a dark corner of the common room that shows you where everyone is anywhere at Hogwarts. It's called the Marauder's Map and it is dead useful. Whoever Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs were, I bow to them a million times over.

But yes, so the map proves that she's done stuff because there's no way you can be that close in a broom cupboard and not be snogging. But she never EVER talks about it. It's because of this habit of hers that Hannah and I have a bet running. I say she'll be married with two kids in ten years. Hannah says she'll be in a nunnery.

When Monica refused so say one word other than it was nice, Hannah turned to me, grinning. Suddenly her stomach let out a giant growl, signifying she was hungry.

"You'll spill the beans after breakfast," she said, smirking.

We threw on slippers and proceeded down to breakfast, which turned out be a very…interesting…event.

**Okay, I am SO sorry that took so long! I originally planned on making this chapter much longer, but I had to get this out because it's been so long since I updated! Anyway, this chapter is a tad bit shorter than the rest, but I promise to try to get the next one out as soon as possible. If not sooner. But it is a bit hard because I have writer's block, but I promise I will try!**

**Okay so please review, I just love seeing those things up there. It makes me all warm and fuzzy inside. **

**Ciao!**

**-Poplar **


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